One Heart Too Many
by Chelle Storey-Daniel
Summary: What happens when a man steps up and offers you everything you've ever wanted at the same time that a woman does? What happens when you're feeling things that you've never felt before and you question everything you thought you knew about yourself.
1. Chapter 1

Everything you have ever heard about straight jackets is true.

They're uncomfortable.

They're confining.

You feel like they're restricting your air and you can't break free no matter how hard you try.

My life? It has become a straight jacket and before you assume that I need one of those, a padded room, and a body full of Lithium ... I'm speaking metaphorically, okay? And the straight jacket I tried on was after I lost a bet in college ... and then again for sex because I had an ex boyfriend who was just that kinky.

What I'm saying is ... I don't do love triangles. The one that I was forced into by George and Izzie was technically a square because both of them have split personalities and I was a random line that cut across it. Whatever. Geometry sucks, but I can assure you now without fail that I am in a bona fide triangle and I'm the top most point and two people are making me insane. I've never really been the object of any one person's affection, but now I have two people who want to be with me and I am at the crossroads. Two roads lie before me ... one is dangerous to the point of risking my heart again and the other is safe because that person looks at me and I know that they would hurt themselves before they hurt me. It's not a high road/low road scenario, either. They both say and do things that I want to believe because I've never had anyone go out of their way to make me feel important, but I can't choose. The really fucked up part is that neither one of them has said I should choose.

But I want to.

Because I'm not into triangles. Or squares. I want a point A and a point B and one of those needs to be me.

I guess it all started with Addison coming back and assuming that I was with Erica. She referred to us as 'a happy couple' and I pretty much freaked out. Addison knows me better than just about anyone in this world. So what if I had thought, drunkenly, that Erica was pretty hot. So what if Erica saying that she liked my hair curly had me retiring my straightening iron. So what if making Erica laugh felt like I had accomplished something with my day. It didn't mean that we were a couple or that I wanted to be. It meant that she was my friend and I cared about her. Right?

Well, I cared about her so much that I went to the Archfield with Mark Sloan and let him do every dirty, raunchy, incredibly sexy thing that a man can do to a woman. Repeatedly. All night. And then again before work. By the time we got to Seattle Grace that day we were late, my body was sore in that good, kinky way that means you know what you're doing in bed, and Chief Webber was on the warpath.

So, let's just start there.

Coming off the elevator, Mark put his arm around me. It was something he had done many, many times before. We had become fairly decent friends after George ripped my heart out and threw it in my face. Mark had sat in the dark with me after I was fired as Chief Resident and Mark had taken me to see some stupid plotless movie that same night and he didn't make any sexual references because I would have killed him. We were comfortable. The kind of comfortable that let him call me at one in the morning to ask about a football score because his surgery ran long. The kind of comfortable that meant he thought nothing of picking up my coffee cup at the morning meeting and finishing it off or helping himself to half of my honey bun in the monthly M&M.

He also thought nothing of over sharing his abundant sex life with me by pointing out this intern, that nurse, or one of those volunteers that had warmed his sheets the night before.

So, he had his arm around me and he was whispering in my ear that we should meet in the on call room later, that he really enjoyed that thing I did with my hips, and that I smelled good when Chief Webber shouted at him and came charging like a mad bull toward us. For weeks, I felt Webber's wraith as Chief Resident and I decided right around that time that he wasn't particularly fond of me so I made a hasty retreat and ran straight into Cristina.

"Do something about Hahn!" she snapped, her hands on her hips. She really can be impressively pissy.

"What?" I asked, watching Webber and Mark out of the corner of my eye.

"I tried to get her to talk to me last night while you did the Mating Dance of Gay Denial with Sloan and she -"

"Wait - what? While I did the what?"

"Everyone knows so stop trying to infect yourself with an STD and embrace it. You're the reason she's in a bad mood today anyway." Cristina narrowed her eyes into slits. "She listens to you. Make her teach me, Callie. Make her let me operate on hearts because I'm wasting my time with banged up knees and ulcers and my hands are way too skilled for that!"

"I cannot make Erica do anything! And I am not with her!"

"I know, I know ... you love penis. You're a big fan of penis. The entire cafeteria heard you yesterday." Cristina met my eyes and I looked away. "If you don't make her stop treating me, the me who is your roommate, like shit ... then you gotta go."

"You cannot keep threatening to kick me out! That's unfair."

"Well, hell! Life is unfair! I'm scrubbing in on a tonsillectomy while Meredith just went into angioplasty. With Hahn!"

I watched her walk away and closed my eyes wondering if this is how George felt when I got in his face about Izzie. I hope so. Because I felt like crap.

Mark touched my arm a second later and when I looked up at him ... I knew that something was wrong. He didn't have to invite me to follow him, one slight incline of his head and we were shut behind the doors of the on call room. I leaned against the wall and watched him pace back and forth and rake his fingers through his hair until it stood on end. "What's wrong?" I finally asked.

"A few of the nurses talked to a lawyer. They're considering a sexual harassment suit against the hospital. Against me."

"What's a few?"

"Twelve."

"An even dozen."

The poor guy looked scared shitless. I sat next to him on the bed and put an arm around his shoulder. He was actually shaking. I didn't need to ask why. His career made him happy and as much as he bitched about the rain and Seattle in general ... this was where his family was. Derek Shepherd was his brother, his best friend, and the true reason he had left behind a life in New York. Any trace of a scandal would stop Mr. Plastic Surgeon in his tracks and make it very hard to find work in Washington. Hell, anywhere. I patted his arm and he stared at me. He really, really stared at me. Dead in the eye. "What do I do?"

I shrugged. "Don't talk to anyone unless it's a patient. And hire a good lawyer."

Now, don't ask me how my advice to him warranted me being naked, under him, and thrashing wildly within seconds because I do not know. I do not want to know. But it did. And it was so damn good that I didn't care how much noise I made or he made or about the fact that the slats on the bunk bed fell out with a loud thud and the mattress crashed through. I didn't care that all the blood was rushing to my head because the foot of the bed was still up and Mark was deeper inside of me than anyone had ever been because my body cut off all the signals to my brain and I just went with it. Twice. Let it be said here and now that Mark Sloan knows his way around a woman's body and I had no problem benefitting from that.

Bailey interrupted.

Stevens interrupted.

But we didn't care. There was an unspoken need to prove something for both of us and that's exactly what we did. Mark apparently wanted to prove that the threat of a lawsuit had not broken his dick ... and I wanted to prove that I was still a big fan of said dick. When we emerged a while later there were several conspiratorial looks cast our way and a nice, big announcement pinned to the board that said every staff member would have to disclose their sexual partners, previous and current. I filled my paperwork out next to Mark.

It took me all of three seconds.

It took him three sheets of paper.

The chatter in the cafeteria was all about the new hospital policy. Listening to it as I searched for an empty table reminded me of my Freshman year in high school, when I had fallen down the stairs because my thick glasses had fogged up after science. Yes, I was a geek. Braces, trumpet, glasses, and the requisite ponytail that had flyaways all around my face by the end of the day. I'd like to think that I had grown out of that awkward phase but as I passed a table of nurses and heard my name ... I felt fourteen all over again. I felt like there was something stuck in my braces and they were looking at it and laughing.

I decided to take my lunch to the Resident's lounge instead.

"Torres!"

I jumped at the sound of my name, dropping my can of Coke in the floor, causing it to leak. Erica picked it up and tossed it into the trash, then fed a dollar into the machine and bought me another one. That simple act shouldn't have warmed by heart, but it did. She smiled at me when she set it down on my tray and took it upon herself to tuck a strand of hair that was tickling my nose back behind my ear. "Hey." I said absently, my stomach fluttering the way a school girl flutters the first time someone passes a note asking if she wants to go steady. I didn't understand it at all. "What's up?"

"You disappeared on me last night." She grins that special way that seems to be reserved just for me. She usually purses her lips together and regards people as gnats that she is watching gravitate toward an electric zapper. She usually cocks her head to one side and scoffs at the mere suggestion that any one of the hospital peons would dare address her and interrupt her day. For me, she smiles full out and laughs easily. It's a gut laugh. I think she means it when she does it. "So, what did you do?"

"Eh, you know." That's all I can think to say and she looks away, back at the Coke machine. Her smile isn't there anymore and maybe I'm reading too much into it because I'm slightly paranoid and maybe a little guilty for ditching her, but her jaw tightens and her nostrils flare. She looks angry. "So - uh - what did you do last night?"

"All the men at Joe's last night and you pick Sloan? Wouldn't you call that scraping the fucking barrel?"

The Coke falls off my tray again. So does my sandwich. We bend at the same time and my hand touches hers as we both reach for the can. I pull away as if I've been burned and she sighs. It's a sad, strange sound coming from her and I clear my throat. She looks expectantly at me, like she's waiting for me to say something, anything, but I grab the can and my sandwich and drop it back on my tray. Erica pushes herself to her feet and points at the drink machine. "You want another drink? That's gonna spew when you open it. Sorta like I did last night when you danced out of the bar and left with him."

I force myself to laugh. It's that same strange sounding and high pitched keening that I indulged in when Addison asked if I was speaking 'The Vagina Monologues'. I mean ... who asks that? And who does Erica think she is to make me feel bad for being human? I have needs! "Wow. Tell me how you really feel."

"Okay." She nods at me, ignoring the fact that we're in a crowded hallway. "You and me? We spent hours bonding over the fact that Mark Sloan was chasing after me like a puppy. We spent hours talking about his impressive black book and the fact that he had Don Juan'd his way all over the hospital. You even joked that he could hire himself out for stud service and never have to work again. So, what are you doing?"

I'm not laughing now. And people are stopping to stare so I try to keep it light. "I, uh, guess I hired him."

"Was it worth it?"

"What?"

"You murdered your self respect and let him make you a notch on his bedpost."

"Don't." Now my nostrils were flaring.

"Truth hurts?"

Okay, that pissed me off. "You need to walk away before you eat this tray."

She gives me a look of utter disgust. It makes me feel dirty. "I thought better of you."

"Then don't think!" My hands are shaking a little as I kick the door open to the lounge and stalk inside.

Cristina is standing with her mouth agape. "Way to go, freak! Now she's never going to let me scrub in!"

And that ... that's really how I lost control of my life and became someone I never, ever thought I'd be.

"Penny for your thoughts."

It's been a while since I bellied up to The Emerald City Bar without Erica in tow and even longer since I asked for a bottle of Joe's best whiskey, but there it is. I'm five shots into it and that's probably why he pauses in front of me to wipe non-existent dirt from the counter. "How are the kids?"

"How are you?"

I take a shot and stare at him. Good, reliable Joe. Great adviser, great listener, great guy. "How did you know you were gay?"

"This is about Erica, right?"

"Shit."

"I dated women," he says, leaning his elbows on the bar. "I just didn't connect with a woman the way that I do with men. One man, actually. Walter ... he made me laugh. He made me feel good on the worst days. And I knew I was gay because that's who I am. I looked in the mirror one day and I knew."

I glance into the row of mirrors behind the bar and stare at my reflection. Sunrise Yoga has been good to me. I've lost weight since George made his asinine comment about me being 'curvy'. I didn't do it intentionally really. I did it because I could and because I became more active after I started hanging out with Erica. She likes to hike and I like to climb mountains so we combined the two. We went camping a couple of times and embraced the outdoors until Poison Ivy embraced us both. And okay ... maybe I wanted to look really, really hot for the divorce paper signing, but I could have shown up naked and drenched in chocolate for as much attention as George paid to me. Thank God I'm over that.

As I gaze at myself in the mirror, Mark walks in and spots me. I watch him make his way toward me and take another shot. He sits down and helps himself to my bottle and the glass and drains two generous helpings before he speaks. "I need to break something."

Joe cautiously moves several tumblers out of the vicinity and says, "What would you like?"

"This is fine." Mark points at my bottle and Joe makes himself scarce. "This day? Fuck it."

"It had a few highlights." I give him a knowing smile, but he doesn't return it. "Mark?"

"I had four surgeries scheduled for today and not one nurse would scrub in. So, they all got cancelled. I'm a surgeon." He fills the glass again and kicks it back. "I operate. My hands are steady and my ability is known from coast to coast. And the only thing I'm recognized for now ... is being a whore."

This is one of those moments where you don't know what to say, by the way, so forgive me for what came next. "Well, you're a good whore. I heartily approve."

He sets the glass down a little harder than he needs to. "This is where I remind you that I mopped up your puke after you got fired as Chief Resident so could you please not do that?"

"That wasn't when I puked. That was when you took me to see Jack Black not act his way through an hour and a half. I puked when I had the flu and Cristina kicked me out so she wouldn't catch it."

"Oh." He fills the glass once again. "Well, you would have died in the on call room if I hadn't shot your ass full of medicine so pretend I have the flu and ... help me."

"You want a shot of Phenergan?"

"No! I want you to ... damn, this liquor is going to my head." He rubs his face and for the first time ... I notice that his hair has a lot of gray in it. And he looks tired. He has luggage under his blue eyes that makes him look haggard. "When Derek married Addison ... I pretended she walking toward me. I pretended that all the people in the church were there to see me, to shake my hand, to wish me a happy life. I hated him for having someone."

"Is that why you slept with her?"

"No. I slept with her because I loved her. And she wasn't happy with him. She deserved to be happy."

I nudge him with my shoulder. "What makes you happy?"

"Lately? You."

I'm generally immune to pick up lines, but I guess I'm drunk enough to let those words slide over me like honey because I pay the tab, grab my purse, and invite myself back to his room again. We make great use of the hot tub, the shower, the sofa, and the bed. I wake up at five the following morning and watch the sunrise. He joins me before the light show is over, standing behind me with his body pressed against mine and his robe wrapped around both of us. I like the feel of his strong, sturdy arms and the way his breath against my neck causes me to shiver.

I like him.

Fuck.

"Peace offering?"

I'm working my way through the chart from hell and scribbling frantic notes about which intern to yell at for making a mess of my instructions when a Caramel Frappuchino is thrust under my nose. I have to grin. Erica mocked me for days about my 'girly' taste in coffee while she talked rapturously about espresso shots and house blend the first time we visited Starbucks. "Did you turn bright red when you ordered this?"

"No, but I did do it through the drive through so I wouldn't have to walk out with it. I do have my pride."

My mind wonders if that pride happens to be gay, but I can't ask that. I'm mortified that I asked Joe about his sexuality. I'm so mortified, in fact, that I sent him a fruit basket. Don't ask, okay. The Archfield is limited on what they can accomplish at the spur of the moment and I was in a hurry because Mark was waiting in the car. Anyway, I accept the coffee and smile at her. "Which part are you trying to make peace with? The part where you basically implied that I'm a whore or the part where you said outright that I have no self respect?"

"I'm actually very sorry about that." She clasps her hands in front of her. It's a nervous habit that she has. If she crosses them, watch out, but if she clasps her hands and slumps her shoulders a little ... she's worried. "And I'm making peace with the whole ... boyfriend ... thing."

"Mark is not my boyfriend."

"What is he?"

Hmm. I wasn't expecting that. "He's fun."

"Fun? That's all he is?" Erica looks thoughtful for a second. "Well, I'm fun, too. And I'm a way better dancer and I let you win sometimes at darts. And I'm also your friend so if you'd let me buy you dinner tonight to apologize ... I'd appreciate that."

"You don't have to do that." I take a sip of the coffee and moan in gratification. "This is more than enough."

She holds her hand out. "Give it here."

"No way. You can't take it back just because I won't let you buy me dinner. Buy me coffee daily, for heaven's sake!"

"I wanna try it."

"Oh. Okay."

Erica sips out of my straw and so help me God ... I'm drawn to her lips. I'm drawn the way she licks them when a little of the frozen coffee drops from the straw and lands on the bottom one. It shouldn't be a thought, but my own tongue moves out just a little as if it wants to volunteer to help with that tiny spill. I rationalize it by telling myself that any drop of Caramel goodness that is wasted is a drop to cry buckets over, but I know that it's something more. And I swear on the ring my dad gave me for graduation ... she knows what I'm thinking because she does it again.

I keep watching.

Finally, she hands it back to me and I say, "Do you like it?"

"Strawberry lipgloss?"

I've become mute.

"I like it." She winks at me. So help me GOD ... she winks at me. "But the coffee is disgusting."

I notice Cristina standing a few feet away. She's doing some kind of gestures with her hands that absolutely cannot be considered American Sign Language, but I get it. She's asking me to get her into Erica's surgery and the fact that she's pointing at the surgical board means that it's happening soon. "Erica, do you have a resident yet?"

She nods, "Stevens, why?"

"You know ... Stevens ... doesn't really appreciate cardio. Cristina does so -"

Erica realizes that Cristina is watching us and gives her that patented death glare of doom. Cristina stops gesturing and folds her hands primly, acting like she's interested in an ugly piece of art that would look really, really great in a landfill. She's so transparent I could laugh, but I don't. "Let me buy you dinner," she says, "And Yang is in on this surgery and the next three."

Cristina is now whistling some off key something that sounds vaguely like Madonna, but could be a cantata and I feel so bad for her that I agree. But, let's be honest, that's not the only reason I say yes. Erica became my best friend in a short span of time. She kept me sane when my life was going through a million changes, she answered my cell phone and told my father I was in surgery when I text messaged him that the divorce was final, and every time we get dressed up to go out ... she tells me I'm beautiful. What she actually says is some variation of 'Woo, every guy in the place better watch out'. I've never told her that what she says matters more than how much attention my cleavage gets by every Tom, Dick, and Harry in the room. I'm more than flattered by her ... I actually value her opinion.

So, we meet at seven thirty and she tells me that it's raining. I never have an umbrella, but she does. She opens it and lets me get under as we walk toward a cute little seafood place that is shaped like a boat. I'm wearing jeans and my leather jacket is a stark contrast to the tailored suit that she is wearing. It's beige and looks amazing with her skin tone and I'd never be caught dead in anything so conservative, but it works for her. We get a table near the back of the restaurant and hang my jacket on the back of the seat. She keeps hers on.

We don't talk about Mark Sloan.

She never skirts close to that topic.

When we're finished with our crab legs and she has paid the bill, we stand in front of the restaurant like two uncomfortable teenagers on a first date. We both speak at once, then laugh nervously, and look away. I can't take the pressure of it so I say, "Thank you for dinner. You really didn't have to buy."

"You really didn't have to threaten to make me eat your lunch tray. I knew I had crossed a line before that."

"I'm big with the hollow threats."

She smiles a little and opens the door of the cab that was waiting. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"You don't want to go to Joe's?"

"Not tonight."

When the cab driver asks me where we're going ... I give him the address to the apartment that I share with Cristina.

I don't even know if Hahn is gay or if I'm being paranoid enough to read 'gay' in everything she does. And I don't know why I'm paranoid.

I guess maybe it's because I've never found another woman attractive. I've never had the hairs on the back of my neck dance upward because a woman comments on my form during Yoga. I've never had these thoughts about ANY woman (with the exception of maybe Angelina Jolie and I can't really help the pornographic value of my dreams), but Erica is affecting me in a way that I don't understand and wasn't prepared for. God damn Addison Montgomery for planting this seed. That's all I can say. I was fine until she suggested it.

But what I have been doing with the suggestion ... the obsessing, the worry, the sorta semi-fantasizing is all me.

I think I like her.

LIKE her, like her.

When I get home and drop my purse on the counter, Cristina is watching television. I flop down beside her and say, "How was your surgery with Hahn today?"

"Your pimp hand is strong. She let me assist."

I glance at the television and gasp. "What the hell are you watching?"

"I ordered extended cable so you can watch 'The L Word'. Think of it as a course study."

"For the last time ... I am not gay."

"You like penis."

"I like penis."

She smirks at me. "You ever been with a woman?"

"NO!"

"You didn't sleep with Addison?"

"What!? No, I did not! Why would you - SHIT! Does everyone think I'm gay?"

"Not gay. You are, after all, enamored with the man meat ... but maybe you're bi-sexual."

"It is impossible to be bi-sexual if you've never been ... bi-sexual."

"Bi-curious, then."

I turn my head and look at her closely. "Are you ... bi-sexual?"

"I have been known to experiment." She points at the television and I watch two women going at it. I've never been a porn watcher ... I tend to make my own ... but I can't look away. It's pretty tame, erotic and not dirty, and I find myself wondering what it would feel like to have soft hands instead of rough and hairless skin instead of hairy touching me that way. Maybe I am curious. "Callie?"

"Hmm?"

"People wonder if the two of you are a couple because you're the only person who makes her human. And she's the only person who makes you forget that were were sad enough to move onto my couch and cry yourself to sleep every night." She gets up and hands me the remote. "I'm throwing my support behind her because Mark Sloan isn't a heart surgeon and you sleeping with him will do nothing for me."

"Gee, thanks."

"I'm not finished." She waits until I look at her. "You can sleep with every man in Seattle, hell, on the East Coast, but that won't erase what you know you're feeling. It simply makes you look like a homophobic asshole who has to prove her heterosexuality a little too hard. I'm just sayin'."

She leaves me to the television and I half pay attention to the drama unfolding on the screen.

See, I have this vision for what my life is supposed to be. I want what my parents have. Marriage, kids, and fat grandbabies who spend summers with me and keep me young. I want to be on the PTA at school and volunteer to chaperone school dances. I want to go to bed with the same person every single night and never have to wonder where I stand with that person because we have the promise, the rings, the whole nine yards.

Realizing that there's a blond, nicely shaped wrench that has been thrown into the gears of your life is pretty jarring. I've never wanted to touch another woman or have her touch me ... but I've never known Erica Hahn before, either. It's taking me off guard and it's making me question everything I think I know and I can't decide if I hate it or love the intrigue.

My phone beeps, cutting across my thoughts and I pick it up. It's a text message from Mark.

'Hey, Cal. I was just thinking about you and wondered if you wanted to meet me early tomorrow for breakfast. I need to talk to you.'

I text back that I'll be happy to meet him and we make sunrise waffle plans.

I don't know it then ... but my life is about to become so complicated that I wouldn't even recognize it or myself anymore.

And Joe's advice to look in the mirror will become something that I actively avoid.

The truth is all over my face and I can't handle the truth.


	2. Chapter 2

I meet Mark the following morning at a quaint little diner where the jukebox is always a little too loud, but you know every single song it plays from the fifties so you don't mind. It's the kind of place where you can smell grease the moment you walk in and the uncomfortable booths are hard against your backside, but the food is so damn good that you can forget that you're clogging your arteries or that your ass will be numb for an hour after leaving. This is not the first time we've met for Sunrise Waffles (hey, it's just as good as Sunrise Yoga). That's literally what it's called on the menu and the short order cook puts sunrays of cool whip on the plate. It's the tackiest thing I've ever seen, but it's sinfully tasty and I always smile when the waitress puts it on the table in front of me. Mark and I have been coming twice a week for a couple of months. The second time Mark and I ate here ... he asked for the cool whip and drew a face and large penis on my waffles before I could stop him.

Then he wrote 'Do me?' on his and I smeared it around with my knife until it said 'no'.

I didn't keep my word.

I think I've had more sex with him in the past couple of days than I did with George the entire time we were married. I really didn't expect to ever go there again. Every time he propositioned me I shot him down and he just took it in stride, but it didn't deter him. And I can't even blame alcohol because I wasn't that drunk when I asked him to take me back to his place during Addison's visit. And I'm not drunk now when I see him sitting at our usual booth with his hands wrapped around a cup of coffee. He's an incredibly sexy man. If I was blind ... he still would have gotten in my pants because he's that damn charming sometimes.

"Hey, you!" I drop my purse on the bench seat and slide onto the torture device, facing him. "Traffic ... it's a bitch and if the sirens I heard on my way in are any indication -"

"How are you?"

"Er, good. You?"

"I think we should date," he blurts out.

I shouldn't have lifted his coffee and sipped it right then because let me tell you ... it hurts coming out your nose. I gasp for air and eventually collect myself, though I'm looking at him with blurry vision when I gasp, "What!?"

"I like you." He hands me a tissue and I dab at my eyes. Apparently an elderly couple at the bar think that he's just proposed and I'm overcome with emotion because the old man says something about young love. Mark ignores it and keeps looking at me. "I think you're beautiful and you're fun ... and ... it took me three sheets of paper to Date and Tell. Your name was the last one on there and ... well, I'd like to keep it that way."

I want to call 'bullshit', but he's not smiling and he's looking at me like I could knock him over with a feather. I don't know whether to laugh at him or run. I opt to do neither. "Did you order yet?"

"What? No." He takes the cup from me and sets it back on the table. For a second ... he looks like he wants to hold my hand and I leave it resting there in the open just in case ... but he simply wraps his long fingers around the cup again. I can't stop looking at those fingers. I hate my life. I realize he's still talking and fight to pay attention. "I mean, we already sorta date, Callie. We come here. We go to the movies. We have sex. Lots and lots of sex and ... we're good at that. So ... we should date."

"Did you ... bump your head last night? Take any drugs?"

"I took your advice. I talked to a lawyer about the nurses and he said that ... well ... I should have a girlfriend. One ... girlfriend. And I choose you."

"Should I be honored?"

"I'm serious."

My eyebrows raise so high that not even Botox could bring them back down. "You have go to be kidding me! You don't just ... announce that you want to date someone because your lawyer told you to! And I don't want you to choose me like you're the second coming or something. You're not."

"Ouch." He puts a hand over his face. "I'm not saying this stuff like I planned."

"No shit."

"I like you," he repeats. It doesn't help my blood pressure. "I - I really, genuinely like you. I mean ... I know more about you than any other woman alive. For instance ... you want to kill me right now and I know that because you're three shades darker than usual and," he moves my silverware out of reach, "I know that you like me, too. We have fun, Cal. A lot of fun and we're good together. And ... I don't want to be a ... manwhore anymore."

"Then get a dog to keep you company at night!"

"I'M TRYING TO SAY SOMETHING IMPORTANT HERE!"

I look out the window because people are starting to stare. "I'm gonna kick your ass, Sloan."

"I don't know what I'm doing, okay? Everything I learned about relationships I learned from watching Derek and Addison and we both know how that turned out. I don't know how to pick out flowers or birthday presents. I have no clue what a woman likes for Christmas ... except my grandmother and she died last year and you don't look like a Dreamsicle type ... but I'm willing to let you teach me. I think you CAN teach me. And - and I'm asking you to."

I think I would have fallen in the floor and died on the spot if George O'Malley had ever said something like that to me. It's not so much the words Mark used ... it's the way he said it. He has propositioned me, argued with me over politics and football, made me laugh until my sides ached by doing a strip tease to 'It's Raining Men' (don't ask) and remembered every detail I've told him about my family, but the way he asks me to help him does something to me. I think he means it.

And I'm not sure if I want him to mean it.

Or look at me like a kicked puppy.

I don't melt completely until he clears his throat and I feel his foot against my leg. He digs the toe of his boot into my shin and I'm sure that's his attempt at romance so I roll with it. Plus ... I'm pretty positive he's wearing steel toed shoes and doesn't realize that he's bruising me. His eyes are too blue for his own good and he's looking at me like I've got some kind of salvation for him. It's beseeching. Sad, really. "Why in the hell would you pick me?" I ask.

"Because in a hospital full of ordinary women ... you stand out."

"Plus ... if you flaunt your girlfriend all over the hospital ... the nurses may give up the grudge and scrub in, right?"

"It wouldn't hurt."

"I'm so moved."

"I'm not perfect." He reaches across the table and touches my cheek. "But I'm as close as I'll ever be with you."

Shit.

Shit.

Shit.

Whoever suddenly gave him a handbook to a woman's heart needs to be shot.

And I want to pull the trigger.

Just sayin'.

We head into work after we eat. I'm technically supposed to be off, but I have patients to check up on. Since we're in separate cars, Mark waits for me in the parking lot and walks inside with me. We wordlessly cross the lobby and I realize that neither of us has spoken since he announced he wasn't perfect. Usually, he has said about ten things that warrant me smacking him by this time, but he's not saying a word and I may as well have laryngitis for all the good my voice is doing me. The elevator is crowded when we step inside and Mark, in some random attempt at being a 'boyfriend', decides to take his jacket off and put it around my shoulders. Her also pulls it together and covers me pretty thoroughly, then puts his arm around me the way he did the day before.

When the lift clears out, I look up at him. "What are you doing?"

"You're showing a lot of cleavage. I'm being the jealous type."

I sigh and shrug his jacket off, tossing it at him. "Ass."

"You looked cold?"

I'd like to think that I could make a man's balls drop with my glare the way my mother can, but Mark seems immune. He grins at me and I smack him. It's like old times. When the doors open again, he's kissing me, I'm enjoying it, and someone clears their throat. We break apart and Mark starts to laugh, nodding at Erica as he winks at me. "I'll see you for lunch?"

"Sure." I make quick work of straightening my purse strap and exit behind him.

Erica was going to step onto the elevator but she doesn't. She catches my arm, right at my elbow, and it feels like fire. Her eyes are blue, too. A different shade than Mark's and much, much bigger. My dad always says that eyes are the windows to the soul and as I look at her ... I think maybe hers is broken. Her soul, I mean. She's sad. I can see it. And I don't know if it's because of me or not, but thinking that it is makes me feel horrible. And maybe a little hopeful.

"Callie?"

"Hmm?"

"Did you go to his place after dinner?"

My hope is suddenly feeling a lot like happiness. I think maybe she really is jealous. Not pretend jealous. "No."

"No?"

"I went home. Alone."

Her eyes move from my eyes to my mouth like she's never seen me before and she wants to memorize every freckle, every line on my face. "Want to have dinner at my place? I put a roast in the crock pot this morning and I rented a couple of movies. It'll be fun."

I nod at her. "Okay."

"Excellent!"

I can see a flash of something on her face. It looks like relief. I don't know why I care the way I do. I don't know why it matters and I could technically be reading more into it than what it is, but I can't deny that I'm happy to see that look there. Even if she doesn't have romantic feelings for me, even if she's only ever thought of me as a friend, she cares that I'm messing around with Sloan and it's been a long time since anyone cared if I drew another breath. I give her a big smile and say, "What movies did you rent?"

"Comic book ones. You've been on me to watch those and I never have."

"Not 'Electra'. Please say not 'Electra'."

"Not 'Electra'. Although 'Daredevil' is on my coffee table as we speak."

"Ahhh, see ... I'm the only person in the world who paid to see that twice." I watch her laugh. She doesn't do that enough and she told me once before it was because she didn't like her teeth. I like that she doesn't think about that with me. There's no pursing of the lips into a thin line to keep from emoting. She just goes with it.

"If it sucks ... I'm telling you."

"If it sucks ... I'll give you back your four dollars for it."

"I bought popcorn, too."

"Yeah, that never sucks. So, seven-thirty?"

She nods at me.

We go our separate ways and I turn to watch her before she rounds the corner. Not classically pretty, Erica Hahn just has a way about her that makes you take notice. It's the strong line of her jaw, the confident ramrod length of her spine. It's the way she commands the attention of interns who want to learn something from Miss Cardio. She walks as hard as she talks and that can be pretty impressive. She turns and looks back at me and I feel like a kid who just got caught cheating on a test. I start walking fast and run straight into the wall.

I can hear her laughing at the other end of the hallway and it doesn't piss me off ... I join her and decide that I'm going to walk hard, too.

I set four bones. God, I love athletes. They can be just as clumsy as they are graceful and every time I make a grown man cry ... I see George's face. Maybe I'm not as over that whole thing as I'd like to think, but it still feels damn good to picture him whimpering on the exam table while I wrench his femur around. No, I'm not evil ... I give the big, strapping lugs pain medication and flirt with them until they don't care anymore, but something in my chest roars when it hears the snapping and feels those bones move. Sometimes, when I set a bone, I feel like I could move mountains. I'm not doing brain surgery ... I'm rebuilding the frame that holds the soul together ... and I think I love that more than the internal doctors could ever love what they do.

After bone number four is taken care of I head to the cafeteria because Mark has paged me. When I get there he's sitting at the center most table and he whistles loudly when I start to get in line. I can feel every eye on us as he points to the tray beside him to show that he has picked something up for me. I grit my teeth hard enough to pop my jaw when I join him and he makes the sweeping gesture. He gets up, kisses me (with tongue), pulls out my seat, and then slides me up to the table with a bump of his hip. He may as well print fliers, hire a skywriter, and take out a full page ad.

"What are you doing?" I ask him when he sits beside me.

"If you eat fast enough ... you." He gives my thigh a playful squeeze and I count to ten.

"You're trying too hard. It makes you transparent."

"Trying too hard would have been buying you flowers and a fuzzy teddy bear." He smiles at me. "So ... which bone did that guy break in his arm earlier that caused him to become a two year old?"

I laugh. "You heard that, huh?"

"I'm pretty sure the top floor heard him."

"That was actually just a finger, but it's bad enough to need surgery this afternoon."

"All that for a finger?" He shakes his head. "Think you can find and remove his man card while you got him under?"

"I'm pretty sure he already did." I take a bite of the salad Mark bought for me. I was technically craving a sandwich, but the fact that he remembered no onions and to add black olives is pretty damn nice. I happen to glance up as I savor a particularly juicy olive and see that I'm getting death stares from the nurse's table. I can't help myself, I smile and raise a brow in a clear challenge, then lean toward Mark and say, "Did you say something about eating faster?"

He smirks knowingly and puts his fork down. "I'm finished."

"I'm finished, too."

The smile fades when he looks at my largely untouched salad. "You sure?"

"Positive."

He carries both of our trays to the kitchen and puts his arm around me. I'd rather he hold my hand which is my own issue. I used to watch the girls and boys hold hands in high school and wonder why no one wanted to hold mine. I spent hours lying on my bed staring at my hand and wondering what was wrong with it. I'd twine my own fingers and close my eyes and pretend that it was someone else. My hands were okay then and they're more than okay now but I feel my palm itch as he tightens his arm around me and kisses my head. I should feel good right about now ... but I don't.

That changes in about t-minus three seconds. The on call room door is barely shut and locked before he's lifting me up the wall and devouring my neck. Have I mentioned that Mark is very, very good in bed? Or ... against walls ... in the floor ... in the shower ... in the car ... hell, he's even got me off without actually being there ... just ... with me thinking about him. When he pulls the tie on my scrub pants and his hand moves over my belly ... I am very, very glad that I agreed to work on my day off.

He gets me off with his fingers and I watch through hooded eyes as he drops me back against the bed and slips his pants down just far enough to slide the condom on. There's something dangerously sexy about only exposing the necessary parts. He slides my pants to mid thigh, just like his, then pulls both my legs over one of his shoulders and thrusts hard. I cry out and so does he. As I grip the edge of the mattress and buck upward, he grasps my thighs hard enough to bruise me. It feels good. When he comes a while later ... he knows that I didn't. He doesn't stop to take off the condom ... he spreads my legs, one over each shoulder now ... and lowers his head. I'm done before he can do little more than breath on me and he eases a finger into me to feel me contract around him. He likes to feel what he caused.

I can't say I mind.

We don't bask in the smooth, sweet afterglow of making love because what we do is fuck. Hard, frenzied, panting, gasping, undulating fucking that leaves us both sweaty and gulping for air.

I can't say I mind that either.

I bloomed very late. I was still a virgin on my twenty first birthday. No one threw me a party at college. No one even knew it was my birthday except Admissions and they weren't announcing it. I sat on the computer that night, listening to the thump of the headboard in the dorm room next to mine and I decided that my virginity was something I would shed as a present to myself. I got up, got dressed in a too tight skirt and barely there shirt that belonged to my roommate, and cashed in my v-card to a guy who was five inches shorter than me and drunk enough to not listen when I told him it hurt or that his gear shifter was digging into my thigh.

The blood in my panties when I got home felt like a badge of courage, but I didn't have sex again for nearly a year. That time ... it mattered a little more. His name was Carlos and he called me 'mi corazon' when he got off. He taught me about orgasms, kink, and yeah, that straight jacket I mentioned was his and he should have been wearing it all along because the bastard was crazy as hell, but I can't regret our months together. I went into that relationship like a lamb and came out like a tiger. I knew what my body was capable of after that and I became a one girl sexual revolution.

I like sex.

I like dirty, raunchy sex that leaves you wondering if you actually just did those thing and what Hell will be like because you're definitely going after that. I like dangerous sex where the thrill of getting caught or falling or drowning yourself because you're almost over your head in the ocean, is in the back of your mind, but you don't heed it. I like casual sex with no strings and no promises of a call later on. And I liked married sex. I did. I liked discovering new things about my husband because I was going to spend the rest of my life with him and needed to know it all.

And I like sex with Mark.

Even though we don't bask.

He makes me feel beautiful and wanted and like I'm the center of his world right then. As I watch him take the condom off and throw it away ... I wonder if we'll get to the point in our relationship where he doesn't need one. I wonder if he really will stop being a manwhore and make me the last name on his Date and Tell list because part of me wants him to. Part of me wants to wear his taming like a tiara and flaunt it like I did something truly outstanding. I want to brandish our monogamy like a sword of fidelity and stick it into the heart of the hospital, throw down the gauntlet and say, 'He's mine'.

But I can't do that.

Even as he helps me to my feet, pulls up my pants, and ties the string in a neat bow ... I know why we're here. He needs me to save his career and to be the dutiful girlfriend, which I haven't said I would do, but I'm obviously acting like it anyway ... so there you go. He kisses me again and I grimace, pulling away. He knows I don't like to kiss him after he's gone down on me, but he always does it anyway.

He runs his fingers through my curls and gets stuck halfway through. He laughs and pulls his hand loose. "I like your hair straight better. I like it when it's smooth."

"I'll keep that in mind." Like I mentioned before, I retired my flat iron after Erica told me the curls were prettier.

He asks me to go to Joe's after work, but I tell him I have plans with Erica and he takes it in stride.

I sit on the bed after he leaves the room and look at the ends of my hair. I need a trim, but that's not what I'm thinking.

With Mark ... I'm straight. With Erica ... I'm curly. It's like I'm living two lives where my identities are starting to clash.

The problem is ... my curls are natural and my hair is not straight.

Am I?

I buy a bottle of wine on the way to Erica's. She likes red so I get the most expensive that the liquor store has and buy myself some beer. I probably won't drink it, but wine goes straight to my head and I need a clear head for a while. She lives in a nice, big house that is nestled in a nice, big subdivision. I've only seen it once and I was technically too drunk to do more than stumble to the bathroom, but I remember where it is. I remember because the O'Malley family lives three doors down.

I ring the bell and glance that way. Erica has a wooded lot that sits well off the main road and you can't see any neighbors at all, but I still look. I miss Louise. I miss Sunday brunch at her place. I miss family.

The door opens and Erica looks shocked to see me. I wonder if I got the dinner day mixed up. I'm sure she said tonight. "Hey," I say with uncertainty. I wait for her to open the storm door and hold out the bottle of wine. "I'm a little early. Sorry."

She accepts it, looking bewildered. "You came."

"You invited me." I tilt my head to one side, studying her. She's not smiling and I'm freezing in the rain. "Are you gonna invite me in now?"

"Oh!" She steps back, holding the door open with her foot as she motions for my coat. "Sorry. I - I thought - never mind."

I let her take my leather jacket and hang it on a hook behind the door. "You thought what?"

"You and Sloan? Hot new couple alert. I thought you'd be with him."

I can't reply because a fuzzy little red Pomeranian tumbles down the stairs and into the living room. Its nails click for purchase on the hardwood as it spots me and starts to yap. The thing is too tiny to create such a ruckus and when it finally tears toward me, I bend down and let it leap into my arms. "Who is this?" I ask, grinning as it proceeds to lick my hands and struggle to reach my face. "So cute!"

"What the hell?" she says and she's clearly stunned. "That little shit has never licked me."

"His name is little shit? Could be why."

She makes a face at me. "That's Buddha and he hates me."

I stand with the dog in my arms and he presses his wet nose against my chin. "Buddha, huh? Feeling Zen when you named him?"

"I didn't name him. I just got stuck with him." She reaches out to touch his head and he growls menacingly, showing stubby little teeth that would probably do less damage than a paper cut. "Fucker."

I give him a kiss on the head and set him down. Erica yelps when he races around me and then bites her bare foot. He takes off up the stairs and I laugh when I hear him fall in the hallway. "You're right ... he hates you."

She examines her toe and shakes her head. "I need to steal a lethal injection from the hospital and put him out of my misery."

"That's just mean." I breathe deep and my mouth starts to water. "Unless you're uninviting me ... I'm starving and I haven't had real food in forever."

"I'd never uninvite you." She nods for me to follow her into the kitchen.

Its beautiful. The white cabinets are covered in what looks like wainscoting. The walls are done the same way and the wood has been distressed to make it look old. I can tell right away that she likes to cook. Over the oversized island is a large rack and well used pots and pans are dangling from it. The gourmet oven is twice the size of a conventional one and the refrigerator is hidden behind a cabinet that I never would have noticed if she hadn't opened it. She motions for the six pack of beer I carried in and puts it inside, then she washes her hands and opens the lid on the crock pot.

I feel like I've died and gone to heaven.

I wash my hands as well and set about making the salad she had obviously been working on when I arrived. It's small, clearly meant for one, so I tear up more lettuce and add it to the bowl. While I do that, I say, "Just because Mark is in the picture ... that doesn't move you out of it."

"I don't like him."

"He's not that bad."

"Every nurse in the hospital would say otherwise, but I don't want to talk about him." She turns, holding up a fork that has roast on it. I watch her blow on it and when she feeds it to me, I close my eyes. My taste buds start to dance. "Oh my GOD! That is so good!"

"My mother didn't give me much growing up, but she did leave me her recipes."

I swallow while she goes back to cooking. She's never said much about her family except that her parents died together. I know she's an only child, too. "Your mom was a good cook, then."

"She was okay when she wasn't drunk."

I'm torn between asking more and leaving it at that. What can I say ... I'm nosey. "Did she drink a lot?"

"Oh, you know, only if morning, noon, and night is a lot. My dad, too. They were partiers."

I notice that she adds a couple of rolls to the two she had laid out on a pan and I realize that she honestly thought that I wasn't going to show. She had genuinely not expected to see me. That makes me sad ... to think of her in this big, cozy house sitting alone at the oversized kitchen table with nothing but a hateful dog to notice her. I know what that feels like. Without the dog. "I'm sorry."

"For?"

"Everything." I finish the salad and dry my hands on a paper towel. I move to stand next to her at the stove and watch her stir brown gravy. "I'm not going anywhere. Mark doesn't change the you're the best friend I've ever had and ... I'm not going anywhere. I'm here."

Her chin actually trembles. I see it before she can look away. She absently runs water into a cup and adds a little to the gravy before she says, "Thank God for that. Because I'm used to you and I don't like people."

"We still have that in common."

She doesn't talk about her family again that night. When the credits eventually roll on 'Daredevil', she hits me with a pillow. "That was so bad! I cooked for you and that's how you repay me?"

"Hey, you rented it. Not me." I grab the pillow and smash it into her face. "Be warned ... I've watched it enough to know all the super power moves."

"You don't need a movie for that. You were born with it, Break and Shake."

"Break and Shake!? Is that honestly the best you can do?"

"Hey, I'm tired. Leave me alone."

I glance back at the television and gasp when I see the time. It's nearly one in the morning and we both have to work the next day. "Shit. Time flies. I should get going."

"It's pouring rain. You want to sleep in the guest room? I've got two to choose from."

I am exhausted so I don't think twice about saying yes. I've also got an overnight bag in the car because I was going to go see Mark. I leave it outside, though, and follow her upstairs. Buddha comes running when he hears us and he has a chew toy in his mouth that is bigger than he is. He bounces up and down with it and I grab one end, tugging upward. He stays attached to it, dangling like a soap on a rope, while he shakes his head back and forth. Erica watches the exchange with her mouth hanging open.

"What?" I ask, the dog still hanging off the ground and snarling playfully.

"She used to -- he likes that. His, uh, owner used to play with him like that."

"Well, maybe you should give him back to her."

"She died." Erica is still looking at the dog. "Four years ago. I promised to take care of him."

I lift up the rope and cradle Buddha in my arms. He tugs at the frayed edges, chewing intently. "Did he belong to your mother?"

"No." When she looks back at me she does that thing again ... that thing where she looks at my lips, my nose, everything. "He belonged to my ... best friend. She passed away."

"Oh! I apologize. I didn't mean to pry."

"You didn't." She points down the hallway. "There are fresh towels in the bathroom if you want to take a shower and there's an extra blanket in the bureau if you get cold. Looks like the dog is sleeping with you."

The way she says it makes me think that she's referring to Mark. She says goodnight and heads across the hall. I put Buddha on the floor and he abandons his chew toy in favor of trailing me to the bathroom. He sits patiently and watches me wash my face and rinse my mouth. I'm talking to him softly when we step into the hallway and light from the bathroom illuminates a photo on the wall. It's an eight by ten framed in black and Erica has her head on a woman's shoulder. That woman is holding a very puppy sized Buddha, who has a lock of her long, brown hair in his mouth. She's laughing at his antics while Erica gazes at the camera with an ear to ear grin.

I open the door a little and see another photo. This one shows the same woman, color gone from her face, her head completely bald, and Buddha is in her lap. Despite the fact that she is obviously ill, her smile lights up the photo like a ray of hope. Perfect teeth, flawless skin, sparkling green eyes and an IV in the back if her hand. Erica's not smiling in that one. She's looking at the woman like she misses her already ... like she's already lost to her for good. I felt that way when Addison moved. I took her to the airport and I stood in the parking lot watching planes leave until I was sure she was in the air all the way. Part of me thought that she would change her mind and come rushing back out with her luggage in tow.

I'm lucky that I can still talk to her.

And now I realize why Erica clings to friendship with both hands. It can be so fleeting.

I make a promise to myself that I will try to live up to the standard of the woman who died.

I've already got the dog hooked.

As the weeks go by I learn to juggle a boyfriend and a best friend who despise each other. He stops dogging her and complaining about how much time I spend with her and she stops flaring her nostrils like she smells something rotten if I mention him. Mark still doesn't hold my hand and when he squeezes me around the shoulders in a sloppy one armed hug ... I feel like one of the guys. He gives me a necklace with a teardrop heart on it and we take a weekend trip to Canada, where we pose for photos in one of those tiny little booths.

He hangs them in his locker, four poses in all. We look like a happy totem pole, all smiles, tongues sticking out, his two fingers raised behind my head like horns, and then us sharing a kiss. We have a good time in Canada. He doesn't grumble when I want to shop for souvenirs and holds my purse while I try on a shirt for myself. We wind up making out in the dressing room and he buys it for me because, as he puts it, it will remind him of getting a splinter in his ass every time he sees it.

Things slowly change with Mark after that. It's almost like putting our photos in his locker solidifies something for him. He clears out space in his dresser at the Archfield for my things and every time I sleep over he keeps my dirty clothes, has them cleaned, and then he puts them in that drawer. Before long, he moves them to the closet because the drawer is full and I have to wrestle with him to take some of it back to Cristina's. That's when he tells me he's looking at apartments. He stops shy of asking me to move in with him. This is probably due in large part to the fact that I look like a deer frozen in head lights, but I agree to give him my opinion on a couple of places.

He chooses a place in a swanky high-rise in the heart of Seattle. It has two bedrooms, a kitchen to make Chef Ramsey cry because it's THAT nice, and a view of Seattle Grace that more than makes up for the extortion that masquerades as rent. It's expensive. Very expensive, but still less than the Archfield, and he tells me the day after he signs the lease that he needs me to help him pick furniture. I haven't chosen furniture since I bought a bean bag in college, but I like that he needs me. He says that a lot now. He needs my input, my help, my opinion. He needs me.

I help him choose a leather sectional that blends in with the marble fireplace and when he walks through the bedroom suites and points at a four poster, I tell him the sleigh bed is nicer and he pays the extra thousand dollars for that one instead. Like I said, something changed. I'm suddenly valued for more than my body.

The nurses began scrubbing in with him again right after he asked me to date him. I don't think the status of our relationship mattered as much as Webber's meeting with them all, but they came around. Mark is up to his elbows in lipo, tits, and ass all day and he eats, sleeps, and breathes medicine. He publishes a paper in a medical journal and his bio says that he's in a relationship with an 'amazing woman'. He grins when he shows it to me and I grin for days after that.

Erica and I go to Oregon for a four day weekend, to a spa that one of her patients told her about. We get waxed, detoxed, mud bathed, and wrapped, then we sit around at night bitching because we're too relaxed to give a shit that we're bored. I laugh so much with her that my sides ache when I get back.

And then my heart aches worse.

Because Cristina tells me that Mark took a nurse out to dinner and she saw them in the on call room the next day. If anyone other than Cristina had told me ... I would have laughed, then hit them. I see violent shades of red as I stalk into the hospital to find him. Granted, there are no promises between us and he never said that we would last past the threat of a lawsuit, but he saw what George did to me. He offered to kill him and make it look like a cross dressing experiment gone wrong. He let me cry on his shoulder until I had nothing left to give and I refuse to cry now.

I find him talking to Derek and so help me God ... I want to take the pen from Derek's jacket and ram it through Mark's eye and into his brain. Then I want to break Derek's arms so he can't operate on him to repair the damage. Shepherd sees me coming and says something to Mark, who turns and watches me approach. He looks at me like I'm the most beautiful woman alive, but it just makes me feel dirty now.

I break up with him and he is too shocked to speak at all. He doesn't deny anything and he stands there looking at me like I am the one who did something to him. I make sure he knows that he is a womanizing piece of shit who I never want to speak to again ... and then I stalk out of the hospital leaving him with his mouth hanging open in front of everyone who was working on the fourth floor.

When I get to Erica's house ... she opens the door, takes one look at me, and opens her arms. I cry hysterically on her shoulder, so hard in fact that I have to run to the bathroom and puke. She doesn't say 'I told you so'. She doesn't say anything at all as she holds my hair back and massages my shoulders while I heave hard enough to pull every muscle in my body. I didn't realize it until right then ... I needed Mark just as much as he claimed to need me.

And my heart was broken.

For two weeks, Erica and Cristina formed an unholy alliance where they called a truce with one another to watch my back at all times. They didn't let Mark get close enough to me for me to hear his voice and Erica took me to have my cellphone number changed after she counted over one hundred text messages from Mark where he claimed his innocence and begged me to talk to him. After fourteen days ... I finally looked at him. He had grown a full beard and he had circles under his eyes. He hair needed gel and his body needed sleep so I let him tell me in person that he had not cheated.

I didn't believe him.

On the sixteenth day ... my mother called me at four in the morning. She was sobbing, frantic, and broken when she told me that my father had suffered a massive heart attack and was in ICU at Miami General. I was sleeping in Erica's guestroom again and she heard me run down the hallway, frantically searching for my shoes. Buddha's barking was as spastic as I felt when I told her what happened and he chased me all over the living room as I tracked down my purse.

Erica made me sit down on the couch and drink some juice while she called the airport. When she booked two flight first class to leave in two hours ... I knew she was going with me. She threw her things together and we drove to Cristina's in silence. I held the dog on my lap and after I explained what happened to Cristina ... she didn't argue about dog sitting or say a word when Buddha bit her priceless surgeon hand.

She didn't have to tell me what she was thinking either.

Cristina didn't want me to join the Dead Dad's Club.

Erica packed for me as well and we got the airport in plenty of time. I called my brother for an update and found out that Daddy was sitting up in bed and talking so I breathed a little easier on the plane ride.

And slept with my head on Erica's shoulder after she gave me a Xanax.

My dad is strong as an ox and just an ornery as my mother would say. He was teasing the nurses when I got there and I was so happy to see him smiling and laughing that I was able to ignore all the equipment hooked up to him and fall into his arms. I threatened him through my tears and he told me I shouldn't have come. Like wild horses could have kept me away. When I turned to introduce Erica ... I saw that she was flipping through his chart, her bottom lip between her teeth. My heart fell until she looked at me and winked.

She introduced herself, shaking my dad's hand. "Mr. Torres, I'm Erica Hahn. It's nice to meet you."

"Ahh, the infamous Dr. Hahn," he replied pouring on the charm. "My lovely daughter has been singing your praises for months."

Erica grins at me and glances down at the chart again. "Looks like they found clogging in your arteries. Tell mw, Mr. Torres, what's your diet like?"

"What diet!?" He wrinkled his nose. "And you can't ask me personal questions unless you call me Santos."

"Santos." Erica chuckled. "Give me an idea of what you regularly eat."

"I'm Cuban. I eat everything."

I take his hand and look up at her. "Fried foods. Anything fried. Pickles, Twinkies, Oreo cookies ... even fried ice cream"

"How Southern are you people?" Erica chuckles, looking amused.

"My mom is Georgia born and raised and has the accent to prove it," I reply, then nod at the chart. "How bad is it?"

"He needs a double bypass after a couple of days on antibiotics." She holds the chart out to me but I shake my head. I want to be a daughter and not a doctor.

"Will you do it?" I ask her. "I - I want the best."

"Absolutely."

I trust her. Completely and wholly ... I trust her.

I won't regret it.

My mother was Miss Teen Georgia and Miss Georgia Peach. She looks sort of like a peach so it's fitting. Fried foods have caught up with her as well and she's just chunky enough to be considered obese by medical standards. If she was a little taller, she'd be fine, but she's only five four and she's got a good fifty pounds on me. She makes up for the extra pounds by expertly applying makeup and teasing her short, dyed brown hair, into a perfectly coiffed and slightly too large pseudo beehive. She's classically pretty in that 'refined southern belle' kind of way that makes older men notice her and younger men fall over themselves to do her bidding. Plus she has three looks that she can give you when she's pissed. Those three looks will make you say "oh crap', 'oh shit', and 'oh my fucking God she's going to kill me' depending on what you've done to earn it. She's small in height, but not in attitude where it counts.

When she strolls into the room, dressed in pants that are probably capris, but look like ankle pants on her ... I'm so happy to see her that I give a girly squeal and rush to her. I have to bend down to hug her properly, but I'd gladly crawl on my knees through glass to feel her arms around me for ten seconds. She hangs on for longer than that and then tells me I've gotten skinny.

When I introduce Erica ... she decides that she is too skinny as well and threatens us with fried chicken, apple pie, and an assortment of other goodies that I can't wait to eat. Just like my dad, Mom refuses to let Erica address her formally and makes her call her Lori Anne. The way my mother says it, with her slow Valdosta Georgia tongue ... it sounds like Law-rie Ain. And if Erica minds that Law-rie Ain speaks so slowly that it takes her fifteen minutes to tell her how nice it is to meet her ... she doesn't show it.

I have two brothers. Joel is a three years older and Jasper is ten years younger, but at twenty four ... he has the mindset of a four year old. It wasn't always that way. I can remember him being a normal little boy with big boy dreams, but all of that changed when he was in a boating accident. We don't know if it was the impact with another boat or that he was without oxygen for so long under water that damaged his brain so much, but either way, the boy that came out of the ocean that day was changed. He had to learn to speak again, to walk again, to use the bathroom and feed himself. He still has trouble with all of the above, but he smiles at you ... and none of that matters.

I've never brought a friend home to meet him. It's not that I'm ashamed, never that, it's just that I've never had many friends to bring home. Erica knows about him. I never told anyone else though. Not even Addison. When Jasper bursts through the door and sees me ... he nearly trips over his feet to get to me. He's six two and if you let him ... he'll try to climb into your lap. His hair is dark brown and cut close to his head for low maintenance and he will sit and rub his head for hours after a fresh buzz cut. And he'll run a brush through mine for as long as I'll let him.

He calls me Lee because Callie is too much for him. He shouts it now, pulling his slower leg behind him as he rushes for me. He could knock me flat on my back before I know what's hit me so I brace for impact. Two hundred and thirty pounds worth of sweet, kissing, hugging impact later and I still nearly bust my ass. He keeps me from falling with a boisterous "Oops!" and then he's hugging me and patting my back hard enough to rattle my lungs. He plants a wet kiss on my forehead and say. "Hi, Lee! Miss you."

His words are slow and because I know how hard he worked to learn them ... I know that he has no other choice but to speak his heart because everything else is just too hard. "Hey, Jasper. I missed you too, Buddy."

"Buddy," he repeats and points at me. "Buddy too."

He turns then and sees Erica.

I hold my breath.

Jasper stumbles forward with his hand outstretched. "Hi, lady. Hi."

"Hi, Jasper," she replies. "I'm Erica."

"Eri." He clasps her hand in both of his, then touches her hair. "Yellow."

"That's right." She lets him stroke her hair and smiles up at him. She doesn't bat an eye when he pulls a Barbie doll out of his backpack and digs around for a brush. He doesn't want to brush the doll's hair. He wants to brush hers and she let's him, sitting down on a chair with her back to him as he pulls the tiny doll brush though her hair over and over again.

I'm jealous of my brother.

I want to be him.

My parents have money. Make no mistake about it. My mother comes from old Southern money with roots so deep that the fruit is endless. My father, before he retired, was the go to music producer for hot new talent. That's how he met my mother. She was singing backup for a record label he worked with in Nashville and he fell hard. Her family hated his Cuban blood and his family hated her strength, but they worked out perfectly. Out of both my siblings ... I am the only one who looks one hundred percent Cuban. It made for interesting racial taunts in school.

Like I've established, I've never really brought anyone home. I not ashamed of my brother or my mother's tacky doll collection, but I am ashamed of the money my parents throw around like confetti on New Years. I hate it. I've always hated it. When Dad bought me a BMW for my sixteenth birthday ... I cried until he traded it for a beat up Camaro. I went to college on a scholarship, refusing to let them pay. And for the most part, I can pretend the money doesn't exist, but when I take Erica into the family house and she whistles with amazement ... I'm horrified. I don't want her to be amazed. I want her to hate it like I do.

I glance at her nervously and say, "It's not all that."

She nods. "Good. I was going to say that it may be the tackiest foyer I've ever seen. What the hell is that?"

She's pointing at a suit of armor that has been welded into slightly perverted and obviously aroused tin man. "My brother Joel thinks he's an artist."

"Dude."

I laugh. "Dude is right."

I give her the grand tour and put her in a purple room that has an amazing view of the ocean. If she leaves the sliding glass doors open to the balcony she can listen to the waves all night. Her room is right next to mine. It's connected by a big bathroom that has a a round garden tub with whirlpool jets that I can't wait to turn on at full speed. We decided to stay for a week, possibly two. Erica cleared it with Webber.

I need the break.

I call through the bathroom to ask if she's hungry. She is so we eat leftovers, fried of course, then I suggest that we change and go to the beach. I don't wear a bikini. I just ... don't and she didn't pack a suit so we put on shorts and head down to the water. It's a perfect, sunny Miami day.

"Your family is amazing," she tells me, stopping to pick up a seashell.

I watch her turn it over in her fingers and smooth the pad of her thumb against the ridges. "Thanks. Uh ... what are you doing?"

"I've never been to the beach before."

I gasp. "How is that humanly possible?"

"Well, I grew up in the Midwest and we didn't have money for vacations. I went to school in the Midwest and didn't set eyes on the ocean until I moved to Seattle."

"Holy shit! Why didn't you say so?" I grab her arm and pull her back to the house.

We go buy bathing suits and sun block for her because her legs are already red from what little exposure they had, and then I unhook the two person jet ski from the dock and take her on the ride of a lifetime. We jump waves, I fling her off, she shoves me off, she flips us over when she attempts it and I can forget that my dad is resting in the ICU and that she will operate on him in less than forty eight hours. I forget that my boyfriend cheated or that my heart is still burning from that.

I'm seventeen again.

Only this time I'm not all Emo and shit.

This time ... I'm me.

"Tell me about growing up here," Erica says.

We are roasting marshmallows on the beach, over a small bonfire that I built with driftwood. The moon is so big over the water that I swear I could poke it with my skewer. "What do you want to know?"

"How you could hate it." She looks out over the water and her eyes reflect the moon just like the ocean. "I've never seen a place more beautiful than this. It's peaceful."

"I don't hate it. I just hate the money."

"You wouldn't hate the money if you had grown up hungry."

"I thought your mom loved to cook."

"You can't cook what you don't have. We always had liquor, though."

"Wanna tell me about it?"

Her eyes meet mine. "Yeah. I do."

"Okay."

"My mother was very young when she got pregnant with me so she gave me to her sister and her husband when I was born. They couldn't have kids and I don't have to question why. They weren't fit to raise a dog, but they were all I had. My biological mother overdosed when I was thirteen and it didn't really matter to me because I saw her once a year, but that was kinda when I decided that I didn't like people. Because that one time a year that I saw her ... she always said she was coming back for me and I always believed her." She's let her marshmallow burn to nothing, but she doesn't notice. She leaves the stick in the fire anyway. "All I had was school and books so I read all the time and graduated early and got the hell out of dodge. I never looked back. My parents died my junior year of college. One of them had a cigarette in the bed and they were drunk, maybe even stoned, and they burned to death. I had finals ... I didn't go to the funeral."

I've never seen her cry. I've seen the hint of it. I've seen her lip quiver and her chin tremble and her blue eyes swim so much that it threatens a downpour, but when she sobs over the telling of her life ... those tears cut me like a razor blade. I leave the piece of driftwood that I'm sitting on and join her on hers. My arm goes around her and she tries to laugh it off, but can't. "I'm sorry," I whisper. "I'm so sorry."

"You didn't do it." She wipes her cheeks and takes a deep breath. "But you undo it a little more every day. Just by being you."

She leans her head against mine and we watch the fire send up lightning bug embers as it crackles slowly to death.

She would be my undoing, too.

My mother is glued to my father. She spends the night at the hospital even though she can't stay in ICU. My dad tries to make her leave, but she refuses. Jasper spends the night with my brother and his wife. We make plans to have lunch the next day because Joel wants to meet Erica and decide for himself if she's competent to operate. I threaten him before we hang up to mind his manners, but I may as well piss in the wind and try to catch it in a colander. He's rude. He says its because he's an artist.

Erica holds her own with him, though, and I think she impresses him. Jasper can't remember her name and calls her 'yellow'. It fits. She's like sunlight to me.

We spend the entire day with my dad and my mom goes home to shower. I know she'll cook, too, because that's what she does. I offer to take Jasper home with us but he chooses Joel again so he can play with Trevor and Savannah, our niece and nephew. We stay until my mom gets back and then we head home and sure enough Mom has made a feast. We stuff ourselves to the gills and take another walk on the beach.

Erica takes my hand. "I'll take good care of your dad."

"I know you will." I squeeze it and she tightens her grip. Our fingers are not twined. I've held hands with Addison this way after Jamie Carr's baby died. It's supposed to be a reassuring, friendly gesture, but I feel like she's holding onto my heart and I don't understand it.

I'm not gay.

She has never said that she's gay.

I don't know what I'm doing.

Just as I knew she would, Erica keeps her word. She performs my father's surgery and meets my family in a waiting room to tell us that she was able to clear out the buildup. I look at her hands while she talks. She gestures, showing my mother how an artery works and I know what her skin feels like. I know the strength in her grip. She may have operated on my dad's heart ... but I think she blueprinted mine.

She'll keep him under sedation until the next morning and by then ... my world will have changed. I just don't know it yet.

My mother stays with my Dad again. Just. In. Case. We leave her smoothing back his thinning hair and whispering softly to him. Jasper is staying with his nurse so that she can take him on a field trip the next day and once again we have the house to ourselves. We stay inside because a tropical storm is blowing in, bringing with it enough wind and rain to make the shutters on the house bang noisily until I scale the side of the house to secure it. Erica hangs onto my ankle as if it can do some good and then she helps me off the railing I was standing on. She's close to me, my breasts rub against hers when I slide to the deck and her hands linger on my hips.

I freeze.

The sun has vanished behind storm clouds, but he hair is glowing like a halo of spun silk and I reach up, letting my fingers slide though the long part over her shoulder. It feels like silk, too.

I don't think either one of us are breathing.

The only thing that happens is that she tightens her grip on my hips, digging into the cloth of my dress. We're getting soaked in the rain and the wind is blowing hard enough to make us sway ... or maybe it's not the wind at all. I lick my lips, tasting the rainwater and she does the same thing.

Time is standing still ... I know it is.

I lean forward and kiss her.

It's hesitant until she pulls me closer and her hands move to my waist, then my back.

Our tongues touch, our breathing is ragged, and my legs are so weak I don't know if I'll walk again.

She pulls back first and looks at me ... a question on her face that I feel through my entire body.

I nod.

Together we walk into the house ... this time our fingers are laced.


	3. Chapter 3

My brother Joel used to sneak girls in the house. I would hear them whispering in the hallway and I'd know what they were inevitably here to do. Those were the same years that I spent lying in my bed gazing at my hand wondering why no one wanted to hold it. If I'm being honest ... I fantasized about bringing someone home, too. I wanted someone to climb into my bedroom window and make me feel like I was worthwhile. I wanted to feel wanted and when I lead Erica down the hallway to my childhood bedroom ... that's exactly how I feel. She doesn't speak. She doesn't let go of my hand. And when we are in my room all the way, she softly shuts the door behind us. I hear it close and it's deafening. It's final. It's a decision made and I know that there is no turning back. I wouldn't turn back if I could. Weeks from now, months even, I'll tell myself that she made the first move. I'll try to convince myself that I was simply weak from worry over my father and she took advantage of me, but it's not true.

I want her.

I think, in that moment, I'll die I don't kiss her again so that's exactly what I do.

It's softer than I thought it would be, kissing her. Her skin is smooth and her lips are so sweet against mine, tasting faintly of the fruit we indulged in after dinner, that I can't get enough. It's not demanding. It's not rushed. It's a whisper of flesh against flesh and muscle against muscle as our tongues meet again, dancing gracefully. There's nothing urgent, nothing forced, nothing remotely uncomfortable. I can smell the rain in her hair and a trace of perfume as I move from her mouth to her neck. I press my lips against the pulse in her throat to reassure myself that she's real, that it's happening, that I'm responsible for the way her heart is racing. When I suck at her flesh ... her hands move back to my waist then upward toward the zipper of my dress. I wore it for my Dad's benefit and not for any real desire to have it on, but when she slowly eases the zipper down and her thumb traces my spine ... I'm so damn glad I chose it that I could die.

When the zipper reaches the top of my backside, she gives me a smile and walks around me. I feel the tips of her fingers graze my neck as she pushes my hair over my shoulder and then her lips are on my nape. She breathes against me and I feel cold chills dot my flesh as she pushes the capped sleeves of my dress over my arms. It falls to the floor with a little help from me and I hear her chuckle as she kisses a blazing path down my back. I'm not wearing a bra and she doesn't stop until I feel her kneel behind me. She expertly works the clasps on my sandals and slips them off, then she kisses the backs of my thighs ... opened mouth kisses that make my hug myself beside there's nothing for me to grab and I'm going to float away any second now. I know that I can't stand it another minute but before I can open my mouth to protest, she urges me around, her hands on my hips. I turn and look down at her. She leans forward and her tongue traces my belly button as she hooks her thumbs in my strappy panties and pulls them down.

She may have to do heart surgery on me next because I'm fairly certain I'm going into cardiac arrest when she sits back on her heels to look at me. I watch her hungry eyes move over my thighs and she touches the scar that I received in the same boating accident that stole growing up from Jasper. It's ugly, jagged, and located near the crease of my leg. She traces it with her tongue and I swear to God I feel like I'm dying. She moves upward on her knees and rubs her thumb over the scar on my stomach where my appendix ruptured and had to be removed. I can't be self conscious of the scars I bear because she doles out affection to each one as she moves higher still. She kisses, traces, rubs, and touches every inch of me and then she reaches for my arms, which are still covering my breasts, and pulls them down.

I've never seen anyone look at another human body with so much intensity. She tests the weight of my breasts with her palms and even if her thumbs were not insistently rubbing my nipples, they would have been erect. They've been erect since I slipped off the rail of the balcony and they rubbed against hers. I'm not shy under her perusal and when she slowly gets to her feet and covers one of those turgid peaks with her mouth, my hand tangles in her hair. I don't want her to stop. I don't want her to move away or change her mind and I think she knows that because she moves back to my mouth and all the promise in the world passes unspoken between us the same way our breath does. It clogs up my mind until the only thought that flits through the fog is the word 'more'. I want more. I want so much more.

I feel like I'm on the outside of my body looking in and when I realize that she's still fully clothed ... I don't like it.

I don't think I can recapture the same eroticism of undressing her but I try my best. She's wearing a tank top and I push her arms up over her head, letting my fingers skim down her bare skin before I pull her shirt up. I toss it across the room and unfasten her bra. It's a simple, white, not very lacy and incredibly less than slinky bra, but I touch it like it's made of the finest fabrics as I pull it from her. Her breasts are ivory and tipped with rosy colored nipples that are slightly larger than mine. I know this because she steps forward and our breasts touch, tip to tip, and we both look down at it. I think it could possibly be the most erotic thing I've ever seen and I can feel her stomach against mine and I wonder if she's as wet as I am. There's an aching, throbbing, need inside me and I kiss her again as I unbutton her shorts and we fumble with them until she can kick them away.

She toes off her flip flops and takes my hand, kissing it as she inclines her head toward the bed.

I stop her. I notice that she has dimples at the base of her spine, just above her ass. I notice that there's a heart tattoo, so tiny that it could almost be a red mole, on her back. I notice that the thought of tasting that tiny inkspot has made my mouth go dry and the butterflies in my stomach have grown claws and are trying to dig their way out. "I - wait. Erica, I've never done this before. I don't know what I'm doing."

She faces me again, her palm against my cheek. "It's like riding a bike, Callie."

"I can safely say I've never ridden this bike."

"I've got you."

I look at our hands and then back at her. Nothing in the world could matter more than this moment and this feeling. An atomic bomb could go off in the back yard and I'd swear it was all part of whatever she was doing to me. "Yeah, you do."

It takes us a good five minutes of kissing and whispering and panting to make it to the bed. I'd like it to be known up front that I am not submissive. I am not docile or mild mannered, but I happily surrender the reigns to her and let her take over. I expect her to dive between my legs right away and push me over the edge, but she doesn't. She covers my body with hers, slipping her thigh between mine and one of mine between hers. Now I know that she's just as aroused as me and it empowers me, it makes me bolder. I lift my leg a little and she grinds down on it ... I do the same, smoothing my hands over her backside as I push her down a little harder against me as I surge toward her. Our legs are tangled now and I'm not exactly sure where I stop and she begins. We both undulate our hips, we both explore with our hands and I just know ... I know what I want to do. I visualize it in my head.

Sliding one hand between us, my fingers find her clit. I've never touched a woman's body except my own and I know what I like so I do it to her. I roll my thumb around her swollen flesh and listen to the sounds she makes to let me know when I get it right. She is trying hard to stay face to face with me, to kiss me as I manipulate her center, but I won't let her. "Sit up," I whisper.

When she's straddling my hips I slide two fingers upward, into her, and her hands splay on my chest as she rides them. I watch with curiosity and pure, unadulterated lust as she throws her head back and pumps against me, moaning my name. My thumb moves to her clit and I put pressure on it, flicking lightly. Her breasts are bouncing like crazy when she comes. I feel her constrict around my fingers and push a little deeper. I feel the moisture and listen to her ragged cry of release and I'm tempted to preen like a crazy fucking bird because I clearly got it right. I leave my hand against her when I sit up and suck one of her nipples into my mouth. Her hands crash into my hair and she drags my face upward, kissing me hard enough that it's almost painful. I shift my hand a little and she groans, lust renewed. I want to make her come again, but she has something else in mind.

Her palm between my breasts pushes me back onto the bed again and she nips at the flesh of my belly, then my hip, and I know where she's going and ohmygodIcantbreathe when the ends of her hair brush over my thighs. I push myself onto my elbows to watch her. It's more than curiosity. It's more than wanting to learn. It's me wanting to see for myself that she's the one sliding her tongue against me and when she does ... her eyes meet mine and hold. If I lived to be a million years old ... nothing in this world could EVER be that erotic. I don't give a shit what it is. Her blond hair is like a thousand feathers against my inner thighs and her tongue is like velvet and Jesus! Christ! she knows how to use it. Just enough pressure, just enough swirling, and exactly the right amount of suction when she closes her lips around my clit. I start to tremble and it's not from the cold. It's because she's now sucking on two of her fingers and she knows that I'm watching her wet them ... as if she needed to ... and she lifts her head a little to see my face clearer as they glide into me.

Thank God we're alone.

That's all I can say.

I've never been the silent type and apparently I'm not trying to start now.

Her mouth goes back to me and I buck against it. She handles my thrashing well, not trying to stop me, and when I get off ... I say her name like a prayer, screaming it to the heavens. She rests her head against my belly, her hands at my sides while I come down. I thread my fingers through her hair while the waves crash over me and my breathing stops being a fight that I fear I'll lose. When I'm under control, I tug gently on her hair and say, "C'mere."

She slides up my body and I listen to the sound our flesh makes as it rubs together. It's like cotton sheets rustling in a gentle breeze. It feels like I'm being wrapped in cotton when she puts her arms around me. I don't think twice about kissing her. I've never wanted to be kissed by someone who headed south of the border on me. Never. But when I taste myself on her lips, the tangy, musky purely me something, I wonder if she's the same. I roll us until I'm resting on top of her and I kiss her neck, her ear, her jaw line and I keep kissing her until I'm sure that she wants more. I knead her breasts as I rise to my knees and I take a second to appreciate just how beautiful her body it. The comforter on my bed is burgundy as as she lies against it ... I think that it makes her eyes even bluer, her hair blonder, her body creamier. I skim over her ribcage and notice that she's had a belly button ring at one time that didn't end well. I smile a little, raise a brow, and dip my tongue into her naval.

I have to confess.

I'm nervous.

She's completely hairless and when I realize it ... I'm a little self conscious of the landing strip I have. What if she prefers ... no ... I can't think like that. Erica Hahn just proved very, very well that there was nothing wrong with my landscaping. I settle between her thighs and let my index finger trail over her slit. She's watching me so I don't try to formulate a game plan and I don't let my nerves psych me out. And the fact that I'm a thirty-four year old virgin when it comes to this is firmly pushed to the back of my mind. At the first taste of her ... I think that she's sweeter than me. I think that maybe she has honey in her veins because she is so sweet, so unexpectedly sugary, that it takes me mere seconds to go at her like a woman possessed. My nerves don't matter anymore. All that matters is making her feel the way she made me feel. The taste, the texture, the smell of her ... all of it is different ... and yet ... it still feels like coming to a comfortable place. I get her off with my mouth and stay there for a while, breathing her in.

The power goes off before I lift my head and it's darker than hell in the house. I can't imagine how much time has gone by or if the storm clouds are just thick enough to block all light. I lazily slip up her body and kiss her. This time ... I can taste both of us and I devour that taste. I come pretty close to smacking my lips when we finally pull apart in search of air. She pulls me into her arms and hangs onto me.

We establish something in that moment.

She likes to hold.

I like to be held.

She likes to cling with both hands because so much has been taken from her in her life.

I like to have arms around me because I waited so long for them to be there.

I rest my head on her shoulder. It's not a broad, muscular shoulder like all the others I've rested on (George notwithstanding). It's like a down pillow and I close my eyes.

We bask.

Basking is good.

We bask until we're both freezing to death and I pull her upward and into the bathroom with me. I fill the round garden tub and walk naked through the house to retrieve two glasses and the bottle of wine we had barely touched for dinner. She's already in the tub when I join her. I hand her a glass and step into the water, carrying my own. Instead of reclining against the back of the tub, I kneel down between her legs and hold my glass up. She watches me that same way she always does ... an exploration of my entire face. "To realizations."

She doesn't click her glass to mine and I watch her curiously. Erica clears her throat and says, "To realizations ... and it's about damn time."

I'm smiling when our glasses touch, but neither one of us drink anything.

The wine remains forgotten for the rest of the night, but the things I learn and will never forget ... are just as intoxicating.

We crawl back into the bed eventually and I look up at her. I need to hear it. I need her to validate something for me. "Erica?"

"Hmm?"

"Did I - was I -- okay?"

She turns a little pink, then she's full out scarlet. "Uh ... you really don't have to ask that. I've never - let's just say that three orgasms in one night is my limit and you ... you broke that record a few times over."

"Told you I had super powers."

"I knew that all along."

"Well, you played it pretty close to the chest."

"Actually, I played it IN my chest, Callie. You've been messing with my heart for a while."

"You could have told me."

"If I told you ... I wouldn't know if this was morbid curiosity for you or a pity fuck. Now ... it was neither."

I rub my thumb over her bottom lip. "You've been messing with my heart, too."

"Want me to mess with something else?"

I smile when her fingers walk across my stomach, lower and lower. "You're insatiable."

"You're right."

The next day, I wake up early and go to the kitchen to cook breakfast. I want to stay with her, I do, but things looked different in the harsh light of day. Not bad different ... I just see things with clarity and I need time alone to process it all. I don't really notice that my hands are shaking so much until the third egg I attempt to crack shatters in my grip. I wipe up the mess, wash my hands, and then look out the window toward the ocean. The morning sky in Miami is always a rainbow, but today, after the storm, the colors seem more vivid, more real. I watch greens and pinks bleed into yellows and blues and I realize that I'm bleeding, too. When I lost my virginity to a man ... I bled between my legs. When I lost my virginity to a woman ... I bled into my heart.

And I'm still bleeding.

And most of all ... I'm scared.

I don't like people. I really, really don't like people ... because I grew up listening to the taunts that were directed at Jasper for being 'different'. I heard every variation of the word 'retarded' and so did he. For weeks he ran through the house chanting 'retard, retard, retard' like it was a game. He thought it was a game because other kids laughed when they said it to him, when they bull pinned him and kicked sand into his face. He laughed, too. Because he had their attention and he didn't know that they were looking down on him. He didn't know that he was different or that they regarded him as trash. I don't think they realized that, even without a fully functioning brain, he was twice what they were. He couldn't be cruel if he had to be. But people are. People are insanely cruel.

I skip the plans to make breakfast after the fifth egg shatters. I put on the swimsuit that I bought a couple of days before and walk down to the beach. The rainbow is fading in the sky and seagulls are screeching close to the water. I wade out, dive in, and breast stroke toward the horizon. I don't want to have feelings for Erica. I don't want to drive myself crazy trying to talk myself out of something with her, either. Because that's not what I want. What I want ... is for it not to matter that she's not a man because we've proven that it doesn't matter in bed. I want stigmas and stereotypes and labels to DIE because I know now that there is no truth in them. Why can't the rest of the world know it?

The ocean after a storm is always choppy and I have to struggle with the waves so much that I go under and swim until I can't hold my breath another second. When I break the surface, a wave lifts me high and I hold my arms out to ride it. This ... this is what it felt like with her. I was weightless, I was floating, I was higher than I had ever been and she was warm and wet just like the water. I want to think about that. I want to think about how good she makes me feel, but I don't.

What I think about ... is Matthew Shepherd. He was killed for being gay. He was beaten, tied to a fence, and left for dead. I followed it in the news, outraged, but then it settled like a distant memory in the back of my mind. Now ... it's all that I hear in my head. I think about Gwen Araujo, Brandon Teena, and Lawrence King. All murdered for being different, for being gay. That's the world I'm coming very close to jumping into. I don't like people. I don't care what they think of me. But I care that I'm so completely out of my element in this new world that I want to bury my head in the sand until I'm too old and withered to care about sex or relationships or anything.

How could something so beautiful last night be so hard to face in the morning?

My arms are aching and my legs are tired when I head back toward the shore. I keep breast stroking until I can wade and then I stand up and freeze. Erica is sitting on the beach watching me with a towel in her lap. Her hair is curly ... I didn't know it was like that. It was wet when we went to bed the previous night and it's even curlier than mine. It falls in waves around her shoulders and her face is scrubbed clean. She looks fresh. Inviting. As I walk toward her she gets to her feet and opens the towel. It's clear that she wants me to walk into it, but I don't. I reach for it and pull it around myself, not meeting her eyes.

"It's natural," she says.

I think she's talking about her hair. "It's pretty."

"Freaking out is pretty?"

"No, I like your hair." I look up at her. "I'm not frea-"

"Yes, you are." She sighs. "You're freaking out and I've been there so believe me when I tell you that it's normal to have a morning like this. It's normal to want to deny it and yourself and what you feel because ... it's different. It's strange. But, Callie, ... you were ready for it. You were. And I think if you let me ... I could love you enough that this would be the only morning like this and the only time you ever feel like running from me."

I wish I had drowned.

Why does she have to say things like that? Why does she have to know me and what I need to hear and how to make me want her?

I take a deep breath. "What are we going to tell people?"

"Well, I generally don't broadcast my sex life and ... tempting though you may be ... I don't plan on meeting you in any on call rooms. I keep my relationships and my work life very separate."

"I'm not just talking about work. My - my brother is a minister. He was ordained after Jasper nearly drowned and -"

"You don't have to tell anyone anything, Cal. You don't owe anyone any explanations or reasons for what's between us. It's our business and only ours." She looks like she wants to touch me. She lifts her hand, then lowers it again. "And you don't have to start wearing rainbow pins or get the gay pride bumper sticker. You don't have to introduce yourself and follow up with 'I'm gay' because -"

"I'm not gay."

She does touch me now. She takes the end of the towel and blots at the water on my cheek. "Gay, straight, lesbian, queer, dyke ... they're just words. You don't have to be anything but you ... and I'm happy."

Shit.

I want to kiss her there on the beach. I want to wrap my arms around her and lean into her and let her chase away the demons that have been plaguing me since I woke up. I know she could. I know she's got enough strength in those pale hands of hers to break the world for me if I ask her to. She's broken me. "I'm happy, too."

"And a little freaked?"

"Just a little," I agree.

"Well, for what it's worth ... I was sitting here thinking of sharks and I'm pretty sure I'm way more freaked than you."

"Sharks?"

"Ocean."

It hits me then.

The water is full of sharks but we still dive in. We flail and laugh ... even though we're in their domain.

I'm diving into a life with her, where I'll probably flail and laugh ... even though I'm in HER domain.

Because I think I could probably love her, too. Maybe I already do.

And that makes the danger worth it.

Right?

Right?

My dad wakes up and the first thing he says is that he's hungry. This news apparently breaks my mother's heart because she begs, pleads, and comes close to threatening Erica to get her to relent and sign off on solids instead of liquids. Erica caves when my mother swears that she is about to swoon and we agree to find him something healthy and nutritious in the cafeteria and bring it back to him. He's asleep when we return and my mother looks at us like we've deprived him of something that has killed him. She pays me back by regaling Erica with the most embarrassing stories she can come up with and I'm so happy when my father wakes up again and tells her to stop that I offer to buy him fried chicken and get shot down. We laugh and joke with one another and then Joel arrives and says that Trevor and Savannah miss their Papa. Erica requests a private room out of ICU so that the kids can visit. She also examines my dad, giving him a thorough once over that is well beyond what she would do for a regular patient.

It makes my heart skip several beats.

We go and buy Dad pajamas while he's settled into a private room and when we get back, my niece and nephew are sitting like statues in one chair while they stare at my dad. Savvy is older than Trevor by two years. With all the wisdom of a four year old, she looks up at me and says, "Aunt Callie, Papa is sick so you behave, you hear me?"

"I hear you, kiddo." I ruffle her dark curls and nod. "Papa's getting better though."

"Cow-lie, get me!" Trevor hops up onto the arm of the chair and extends his arms. At two, he's tall for his age and he's the spitting image of me. He's got a heart shaped, generous mouth and the same dark skin that I have. He has his mother's blue/green eyes, though, and his hair is a shade lighter than mine. When Mark found Trevor's photo in my purse ... he said that he could have been our kid. And that gave me hope for me and for Mark because despite his protestations about being a father ... we had the same idea.

Trevor lets me hold him for all of fifteen seconds and then he extends his arms toward Erica. She actually takes a step back like she's afraid of him. She met the kids the day we had lunch with my brother, but she didn't interact much with them. When Trevor reaches a little closer, she lifts him from me and very awkwardly settles him on her hip. She bounces him the way you'd bounce a fussy infant and he grins at her and tells her to put him down. She looks more relieved than she would if she was dying of thirst in the desert and it started to rain. She's clearly uncomfortable and I don't know whether to smile at her or pretend I didn't see it. I decide to go with the latter and turn my attention to the ribbon that is falling out of Savvy's hair.

I wonder if the promise of children is something I'll have to give up if I decide that I am going to be with her. She doesn't like them. She has told me that much before, after I spent an hour setting a little girl's arm and her piercing cries had given Erica a migraine, she said it. Her actual words were, 'Why can't we muzzle the little demons while they're in the waiting room and be done with it? Kids suck.' Believe it or not ... Mark was the one who calmed the kid down. He sat next to her bed after the stitches in her chin were finished and let her shine a light into his eyes and listen to his heart. He didn't tell her fairy tales, but he distracted her enough that she gave him a kiss before I took her to surgery. She most definitely did not want to give me one.

We pass the rest of the day with my family and when Jasper's nurse arrives with him in tow, he tells me that he wants to sleep in his own bed that night. He's also got ice cream on his face and running down his elbows and before I can take him to the bathroom and clean him up, Erica does it. Maybe it's just the size of children that she doesn't like because she's good with him. I can hear him laughing as the water runs in the bathroom and when they emerge, she has made a friend for life. He stands beside her, whispering as my dad dozes again. When Jasper comes to me and says he wants to go home, we say goodnight and take him. I'm a little happier to leave my mom there since she'll have a nice cot.

Jasper grabs Erica's hand and pulls her to his bedroom when we get back to the house. I know that he'll bend her ear about GI Joe, the comic books that he can't read, but loves to flip through, and the Barbie dolls that he painstakingly brushes and sets on his window seat. I decide to try my luck with dinner and see if it fares any better than breakfast. Spaghetti is Jasper's favorite and he loves mine so I cook that and then head to the bedroom to tell them it's ready. I find Erica and Jasper lying side by side on their bellies in the floor and she's reading his comic books to him and making him laugh at all the different voices she uses. Superman is well on his way to beating up the bad guys and when she says 'Pow', she pokes Jasper in the side and he practically rolls with glee. I watch her watch him. She's not looking at him like he's any different. She's looking at him like he's amusing her more than she's amuses him. I always wanted to find someone who would not look down their nose at him.

I clear my throat and say that dinner is ready.

Jasper moves his chair so close to hers at the dining room table that I have grip the legs of it and pull him away to give her elbow room.

He eats his spaghetti one noodle at at time, his chin in his palm, as he gazes at her.

I swear to God ... Jasper has a crush.

When he sees the way she expertly rolls her pasta with a spoon and fork, he tries and tries it until she reaches over and steadies his hands. With all the patience in the world, she helps his shaky fingers grip and maneuver until his fork is wound tight and he stuffs it into his mouth, chewing happily. We take him to the beach at sunset and watch him sit in the sand and painstakingly roll his pants up to his knees. I know from experience that he will be soaked from head to toe in less time than it takes him to roll his pants and just as I suspected, the minute he gets to his feet ... he rushes straight into the ocean. Erica gasps and starts forward, but I catch her arm.

"He's okay. That's the only place he's whole."

He swims like a fish and has the coordination of an Olympic swimmer as he gracefully cuts through the water. We watch him flop onto his back and float leisurely. When I look at her again, her eyes are filled with tears. "Erica?"

"He's beautiful," she says, not looking away from him.

I reach down and wrap my pinky around hers. "I think you're beautiful."

"I feel that way with you." She smiles as Jasper splashes noisily. "You said that he's whole when he's in there, Callie."

"He is."

She shifts a little and takes my hand all the way. "You're my ocean. I'm whole with you."

My brain goes 'awwwww' and my body turns to mush as we watch the sunset. Jasper comes out of the water, sees our joined hands, and decides that he wants to hold onto us to. I don't even care that he sees it or that anyone who wanders on the beach will see it. The three of us stand there ... all of us different, all of us the same.

I should have valued that moment a little more.

After I help Jasper bathe and change into his pajamas, he goes straight to his bedroom. I follow him, asking if he needs to use the restroom before he goes to sleep, but he shakes his head, grabs a brown teddy bear that was mine before it was his and looks slightly mangy, and kneels down beside his bed. I kneel beside him and slowly say a prayer, no more than three words at a time so he can repeat it. I ask God to bless our family, our friends, and to help Daddy heal and come home. Jasper says 'Amen' in a loud, barking voice and climbs under the cover. The mattress is low to the ground because he has a tendency of falling out. I turn on a lamp that sends blue dolphins floating around the room and he smiles at the images, reaching up to touch them. I wish that I could find such pleasure in the simple things. He'll start to doze with his hand outstretched like he does every single night and it'll fall open and empty to the bed. He won't know that it's empty. He may dream that he's caught one of those dolphins and is swimming in their family forever.

I stay beside his bed until his breathing evens out. When he's like this, when his lips are slightly parted and he's snoring, I can see the man he would have been. Charming, handsome, probably slightly egotistical because that's a Torres thing, and just as loving as he is now. His hand has fallen to the bed and I kiss it before I slide it under the cover. I miss not knowing that man. Sometimes more than I can say. We had the hint of him for ten years. I was twenty when he went away. Before the accident, we called him 'Jazz'. He played video games so well that he beat me every time and he lived for his skateboard and guitar. I flew home from college every time he was in a competition with either one and I'd watch him do jumps on his board that would make my stomach lodge in my throat. He always found me in the crowd and gave me a thumbs up when he was finished and was standing at the top of the ramp. I'd give him two thumbs up and blow him a kiss and he'd catch it and put it on his heart. He was never embarrassed to love me. Never.

Joel was driving the boat the day we crashed. His wife was skiing behind us and instead of watching where he was going ... he was watching her. I didn't know. I was lying on my stomach, working on my tan. The last thing I remember is the sound of the impact. It was almost like tires screaming to a halt on the pavement. That screaming was Hope, Joel's wife. She was far enough behind us that she didn't get injured at all, but she had seen it. I flew up and into the boat that we had hit, landing on my stomach where I was impaled in the curve of my leg by a piece of the bow. It went deep. I didn't walk for eight weeks. I didn't want to walk because Jazz couldn't walk. He couldn't talk. When they brought him home and put him in a hospital bed, he stared blindly at the ceiling and drooled all day and night. I went back to college in the fall and didn't come home at all and Joel went to ministry school and became ordained because he felt like he had killed his little brother.

My parents never gave up on Jasper. Never. And the first time I heard him say my name on the phone after the crash ... I dropped it and booked a flight. He was twelve years old and he walked to me for the first time after two years at the airport. He had gotten as tall as me by then and he had not forgotten me ... even though I had forgotten him for a while.

The guilt gets to me now.

I head down the hallway and grab a couple of towels. I can hear Erica cleaning the kitchen and I go into the bathroom, where I try to scald away the past. The water is hot and it fogs up the glass walls, but my tears are hotter.

I don't know what I'm doing.

I don't know why I'm feeling the things I feel or how I'm going to face it when we get home.

I don't know if I want to be Erica's ocean because that's a wild, untamed, and scary place to be.

And most of all ... I don't know if I ever want to sleep without her again. I didn't dream last night. She chased everything away.

I look up when the door slides open. Wordlessly, she adjusts the taps, cooling the water considerably, and then she steps in with me. She's naked and when I look at her body ... I see every single thing I did to her last night. And I can feel what she did to me.

I'm on her before she can even shut the door behind her all the way and neither one of us notices that we eventually run out of hot water entirely. We're waterlogged, pruned, and I'm all cried out when I open the balcony doors so we can listen to the ocean and climb into the bed with her. Once again, she cradles me and not the other way around. She kisses my head and then my mouth before she says, "Whatever made you cry ... I can't help you with it if you don't tell me."

Her skin smells like lilac soap and I don't think we have lilac soap in the house. "It feels wrong to be happy when so much is ... uncertain."

"Your dad's gonna be fine and if we can give your mother a cookbook ... he'll stay that way."

I laugh. "True."

"She's a great woman. I like her."

"She really is amazing," I reply. "But I'm not just talking about my dad. Jasper is obviously smitten with you."

"Ooooh, and you've taken his woman, huh? Guilt's a bitch, Torres. Ignore it until it goes away."

She traces lazy patterns on my arm and I feel the tension start to leave my body. "What will happen when we go home, Erica?"

"What do you want to happen?"

I don't hesitate. "This."

"I can do that. Anything else?"

"I want to be able to hold your hand at work, but I can't. And that makes me a homophobe or a -"

"You know what? I don't need you to hold my hand at work to know that you've got me in your palms. And you're not homophobic ... I can guarantee you that your feelings and your worry and your doubt ... that's all part of the journey." She tightens her grip on me. "I took it myself."

"How did you know you were gay?"

"After I banged half the swim team in an attempt to prove that I liked penis and flat chests ... I decided to stop fighting the attraction I had to Rachel and she taught me ... how to ride the bike."

"Was it ... hard?"

"We never came out of the closet if that's what you want to know. We were best friends outside the house and lovers inside it and when she died ... her parents shocked me by writing 'beloved partner' on her headstone. They never acknowledged it past that and as nice as that was ... I wish they had told her that they accepted our life. We didn't know that they knew."

I gasp and sit up. "Rachel was Buddha's owner. She's the one in the pictures in your hallway."

"Yes."

"Cancer?"

"Leukemia. She fought it for two years."

"She was beautiful." I say and I mean it, remembering the woman's smile. "How long were you with her?"

"Six years." Erica pulls me back down and under the cover. "It's cold."

"Were you with other women, too?"

"I've dated in the four years since she's been gone and I've had sex with a couple of those women, yes."

"Do you like men, too?"

"I've yet to meet one."

"A man?"

"Yep," she laughs and bites my earlobe, then my neck. "Any more questions, Cal?"

"Were you scared? Of ... being someone else?"

"Scared? No. I was more afraid of not being someone else. Because who I was ... was a stranger." She slides her hand over my stomach. I hold my breath because I think she's going to go further, but she doesn't. She rests it against my waist and nuzzles my cheek with her nose. "You feel good."

I listen to her breathing even out and I turn further into her. She murmurs my name in her sleep and pulls me closer.

When I doze off ... I'm not thinking about coming out of closets or what people will say about it. I'm thinking about how she feels and how I know she already loves me ... even though she hasn't said it outright. She shows me repeatedly. I'm thinking about the way she is with Jasper and how she kissed my tears away in the shower. I'm thinking that I don't have to have all the answers or change who I am because this isn't about being gay or straight anymore ... it's about finding another human being who cherishes your good values and tolerates your bad. I connected with her before the sex ever happened and even though it's wonderful ... she sustains me without it.

I'm not afraid when I go to sleep.

But a few hours later ... I'll be terrified.

I'll be scared straight.

"OH MY GOD!"

I sit bolt upright and beside me, Erica does the same thing. I have the sense to keep the cover up over my naked breasts, but she doesn't. It all hangs out and I watch my mother's bottom jaw drop to her chest. To say that I'm mortified is putting it mildly. I know that the smell of sex is clinging to the room and I know that my face tells her that what she can't believe is what she should believe. "Mom-"

She holds up her hand and cuts me off. Lori Anne Torres has never been speechless. Never. I'd rather feel her wraith than the silence. I don't hear anything except Erica's ragged breathing. This is one of those moments were you hang by a thread over the snapping jaw of an alligator and you can't let go because you want to live, but you know you're inevitably dying so you're tempted. All the blood rushes to my head and I want to reach for my robe, but I know I'll draw back a nub because my mother is about to bite.

She doesn't.

Instead, she puts a hand over her mouth, looks at me, looks at Erica, and rushes from the room.

I breathe.

Erica reaches for me, but I dart from the bed, grab my robe, and rush from the room. "MOM!"

I've made my mother cry three times in my life. The first time was when I was fourteen and she found out that I had skipped school. It's not like I was going to get high with friends. I skipped because the spitballs in my hair got the better of me and I couldn't take it anymore. I went to the beach and sat there until my mother found me and she threatened to spank me, but she yanked me into her arms and sobbed instead. The second time was when I left for college. She held it together until they announced the last call for my plane. I started to cry because she did and I missed that plane because she couldn't let me go. The first thing I did when I finally made it to my dorm room was call her and tell her I missed her already. I cried myself to sleep that night because I had hurt her by leaving her. The third time I made her cry ... I called her and told her I had eloped. She was silent for two minutes and then she fell apart and told me that she hoped I missed her being there as much as she would always miss not being able to see it ... because she was sure that would be sufficient punishment. She assured me she would never get over it and that, I think, is why she didn't cry over my divorce. She hated George for what he deprived her of.

She's crying now, though. I stand outside the door of the master bathroom and knock repeatedly, begging her to let me in. She's crying harder than I did when I curled around the toilet in Erica's bathroom after Mark cheated on me. Hell, harder than I cried when I finally admitted to myself that George had never loved me at all. "Mom! Please!"

I'm crying now. I'm crying so hard that I don't even notice that Jasper has come into the room until he sits down in the floor at my feet and pats my leg. He decides to help me call for our mother and it's his voice, not mine, that causes her to pull the door open. She doesn't even look at me as she tells him to get up and go brush his teeth. She's washed the makeup off her face and when Jasper leaves the room, she swats away the hand I reach toward her. "Go home," she says, through gritted teeth.

"I am home, Mom."

"Your - your father nearly died and you bring this - this perversion into his house?"

"It's not what you -"

"I know what it is. I saw it!" She gives me the look she's famous for, the one that convinces you you're about to die. "Get that ... that woman ... and leave. I'll tell your father that you had to get back to work and didn't want to tell him goodbye. And so help me GOD, Calliope, don't you come back here with her. Don't you ever tell him that you - that this is - he'd be as ashamed as I am."

"But-"

"What if your brother had been the one to wake you up!? What if he had been exposed to that ... that trash!?" She rubs a hand over her face and I think she looks old. When she starts to cry again, I want her to kill me. She looks at me and says, "Go."

"You don't understand what -"

"I don't want to understand it!" she yells. "I'm going to take Jasper with me and I don't want to see you again until you've got this out of your system."

"It's not something-"

"You were married less than eight months ago, Callie! Married! To a man! This is a phase." She sobs again and it's hard to understand her now. "It has to be a phase because I didn't raise you like this and God knows that I want better for you."

"Please -"

"GET OUT!"

She storms past me when I don't move. I hear her yelling for Jasper to come with her and hear him loping down the hall.

He doesn't say goodbye to me.

Maybe he's forgotten that I'm here already.

I want to forget that I exist at all.

Just like she did a few days ago ... Erica calls the airport. I'm inconsolable as I pack my things and every time she touches me I shove her away. I wear dark sunglasses as we stand in front of my house and wait for the cab. The sun is shining and I hate the fact that the world is doing its stupid fucking normal spin when it should have stopped and let me off. When the cab arrives, I don't wait for the driver to load my luggage, I toss it into the trunk and get into the front seat. I lean my head against the glass as we roll down the driveway and I watch until the house I hated growing up is no longer in the rear view mirror.

I don't know if it'll ever be the same when and if I come back.

I want my dad and when we drive past the hospital, I crane my neck and watch until I can't see it anymore, then I let go and cry again.

The driver clears his throat, but he doesn't speak.

Neither does Erica.

At the airport, I move like a zombie from one point to another. I wordlessly refuse to eat or drink anything and I check my phone twice to see if my mom has called me. I even lock myself in the stall of the bathroom to send her a text saying that I get it, that I'm sorry, that I was wrong. I tell her that I was weak and gullible and that it's Erica's fault. I tell her so much that the texts break into seven messages and then I sit there like a bump on a log waiting for her to write back and tell me to come home.

She doesn't.

We're in first class again and I'm in the widow seat. I usually like staring down at the ground below and zipping through the clouds, but right now, at this moment ... I want it to crash. I want to go down and not have to worry about getting up again. Four hours of staring at nothing and letting a steady stream of tears roll down my face isn't helping me. Erica hasn't said a single word to me and if I had not slept with her ... she'd know what to say .. because your best friend always knows what to say. If I had not slept with her ... I'd still be in Florida, sitting on my dad's bed, arguing with him about his treatment. I hope they get another doctor who is just as good as Erica is ... because I'm not there to make sure.

I shouldn't have done it, I tell myself. I knew better. I like penis. I like men. That's the natural order of things and if my mother had caught me in bed with Mark ... she wouldn't have fallen apart. She probably would have asked me if he was as good in bed as he looked. But that's not what happened. She thinks I'm perverted and sick and God help me ... maybe I am. Because I want to put my head on her shoulder and tell her she's worth it.

I don't.

We land with no words passed between us and we walk through the airport side by side with the Grand Canyon between us. We look like strangers who just happen to have the same stride, two women who may have struck up a conversation on a connecting flight and are still too happy for the conversation to go our separate ways. While we stand in front of the luggage carousel she finally breaks under the weight of no words. "You will never know how sorry I am," she says. "I - I should have gone back to my room. I woke up early and I thought about it, but I - I couldn't let you go."

She has to let me go now, I think.

"CALLIE!" I whirl around and see Mark Sloan standing a few feet away. He has a duffel bag over his shoulder and a ticket in his hand. He looks like absolute hell and I watch him hurry toward me. He stops a couple of feet away and says, "I got your parent's address after I broke into the personnel files. I'm on probabtion for it. I was on my way to Miami to be with you. Is - is your father okay?"

My shoulders sag, the pieces of my heart that can still function with sharp broken edges keep pushing my blood through my veins, and I fall apart. When he wraps his arms around me ... I let him catch me. I let him hang onto me and I can feel his paper ticket against my back. He was coming to me. If he had gotten there sooner ...

I don't know how long we stand there. I take off my sunglasses and drag my arm over my eyes, trying to mop up my tears. When I turn back toward the luggage carousel ... Erica's gone.

She's not forgotten.

Even when Mark picks my suitcase out of the mass of identical pieces with ease ... because he knows that the ace bandage around the handle sets it apart ... I'm thinking about her.

I'll do that the rest of the night.

I'll dial her number and stop myself before I hit send and I'll cry myself to sleep on the sofa in Cristina's living room with Erica's hateful dog curled against me while Mark sits in the chair across from me looking as helpless and hopeless and lost as I feel.

When you lock yourself into a box and keep the key inside with you ... people have no choice but to sit on the outside and look in.

Luckily ... or maybe because my story isn't finished yet ... that lock will be picked and I'll keep going.

I'll just fight myself every step of the way.


	4. Chapter 4

When you're really, truly depressed ... the walls close in on you. You see things in techni-color and the effort that it takes to move from lying on the sofa to sitting on the sofa feels like the effort behind rowing a boat against the tide with just your hands. I don't get off the sofa for over forty-eight hours except to pee and I use that time to see if my mother has written back. There are no messages. Nothing. Cristina takes Buddha to Erica's house after I scratch her address on a piece of paper and comes back to tell me that Erica is so drunk that she invited her in and insisted that she drink a beer with her. Maybe that is Erica's way of checking her own messages ... she wanted Cristina to give her something real from me for a moment ... just to prove that she's not tumbling through life without anchors. She doesn't have anyone to call her. Erica's phone was silent the entire time we were in Miami. She's invisible.

I want to be invisible with her.

Mark sits in the hard backed chair that Cristina found at a yard sale and he studies me with his fingers steepled and a line on his forehead for every one of those forty eight hours. I don't speak. I don't move. I try not to breathe too hard because that may encourage him. I doze off an on and when I wake up ... he's still there, still watching me. Cristina eventually goes to work and I notice that she lingers over telling me she'll see me later. It's like a question ... will I really be here when she gets back? Am I going to kill myself? I don't say anything and when she squeezes my shoulder I know that it's just as well. She sees what I can't vocalize. And touching me confirms that I'm tangible and failing miserably at my attempt to hide.

When she leaves, Mark clears his throat and I press myself on the couch again, turning my back to him in the hopes that it will swallow me whole. For two days I've been waiting for it to. I hear him shift, hear the chair creak and groan, and then he's wrenching me off the sofa and I'm too shocked to say anything. He stalks with me to the bathroom, turns the cold water on in the shower and steps under it with me. I try to fight it. I try to fight him. I push at him even as he shoves my head back under the water and it chokes me. When I start using every four letter word I've ever heard and invent a few of my own, he hugs me. I stop fighting. He hangs onto me as I lose it and cry again. I didn't think I had anything left in me and my throat is so raw from it that all that the sounds I make are bitter, like a tiger that growls at people from behind bars because there's nothing in the world it can do beyond that except pace its iron prison.

But it's not me who's making the majority of those sounds.

It's him.

"I didn't cheat on you," he says, actually crying. "I swear on my grandmother's grave ... I didn't. Callie, if this is about what you think I did to you then I'm sorry and you don't have to believe me right now because you're still pissed, but I'll prove it. I will."

Mark Sloan has tear ducts.

He has the ability to not just cry, but to join me in my own hysterics so convincingly that it shocks me silent. I don't believe him. He knows that because he drops to his knees, his arms still locked around me and buries his face in my stomach. He's got chills of his own making his shoulders tremble and I don't know if it's the water or me that has frozen him through completely, but I can't deny it. He clutches me, his face still pushed against my sodden shirt and I hear what he's mumbling. It's a medley of missing me, needing me, and not living without me. And then he looks up and says, "I love you."

Wow.

Just ... wow.

A few weeks ago that would have felt really fucking great to hear. He could have told me over Sunrise Waffles or while we chose furniture for his apartment. He could have mentioned it in Canada or any of the numerous times we met in the on call room, but he didn't. I 'dated' him officially for nearly five months and the most I got was 'I love your ass in a thong' which was flattering, but not exactly the way to my heart. Story of my life in a nutshell, folks, too little too late. "Don't."

I push at his shoulders, but he doesn't let me go.

"Mark ... don't."

The cold water beats a steady rhythm on my back as he keeps gazing up at me. He needs to shave. And the water has slicked his hair back, making him look manlier, more rugged. The tears in his eyes make him look believable and I close my own to keep from seeing it.

"Callie -- I can't do this anymore. I can't - I miss you. You can't keep punishing me for something I didn't do and I can't stand it. Look at me. You know me better than anyone and you know I'm telling you the truth. I - gave you a drawer at the apartment. I gave you a closet of your own, but kept your things hanging beside mine because it was nice to see it there ... and I keep buying Dr. Pepper even though I hate it because you like it and now I have like eight cases and - shit - I swear to God you'd think that English wasn't my first language. I'm sorry. And ... I miss you."

I miss the warmth in my body. I struggle with him until he lets me turn and add a little hot water to this conversation. My teeth are chattering when I say, "Get up."

He does. He gets to his feet, jaw tense, eyes wide. "I didn't cheat."

"I heard you."

"Do you believe me?"

"No."

He flinches as if I've punched him and I feel even smaller than I thought possible. I don't apologize. I can't. "You will," he says. "You will believe me."

It won't be the last time he makes that promise or professes his love. I can almost believe the love part. I fell in love with George after two dates and told him after four. Five months is a lot longer than that and for the three months before that ... Mark and I were inseparable friends. I miss my friend. I miss the jokes and the laughter and the harmless flirting that he probably meant and would have taken me up on, but didn't until I asked him to. I told myself the night that we danced out of Joe's in front of everyone that he was pretending I was Addison and I was pretending that I wasn't thinking about whether or not he could fuck me hard enough to rattle Addison's assumption that I was gay. Maybe I was wrong all along.

I turn off the water when we've thawed and say, "I'm not sleeping with you."

"Ever?"

"Not now."

"Okay."

"Maybe not ever."

"I'll risk it."

He's seen me naked more times than I've seen me naked, but I still go into Cristina's bedroom to change into my pajamas. They were a joke from Joel and despite the fact that it's hot out, I bundle myself in the flannel, snowmen laden depths and hide. Mark asks me if he can dry his clothes in the dryer and I shrug. I don't watch him strip and I don't care that he's wrapped a towel around himself and not much else. When he tries to sit beside me on the couch I shake my head. He goes back to the chair and I glance at his hairy legs. They're different than hers. He's different than her.

I'm really punishing him for not being her.

"You're scaring me," he finally tells me. "What happened in Miami?"

That question will hang like a storm cloud over me for a long time.

I won't tell him.

I won't tell myself either.

A week later and I can count the calories I've consumed on one hand and I'm weak as a newborn kitten as I stare at the surgical board. It's my first day back at work and I actually wonder if I can lift a scalpel because it's agony to just lift my toothbrush, but Cristina threatened to hold me down and do it herself after I yawned in her presence. I go about the motions of the day, but that's all I do. I haven't called home since four days ago, when my brother's wife Hope answered the phone and said my dad was home and hung up on me. My mother must have told them. I won't call again for a while after that. I feel too dirty to dial the numbers and imagine the phone ringing inside our family house ... the one that I lost myself in. So, I stand in front of the surgical board now and I'm so happy to not see my name and that nothing is expected of me that day that I can almost relax. Almost. My stomach has been aching and burning since the night Mark told me he loved me. It's an ache that will not go away. Antacids have become my best friend in Erica's absence. Stress, I tell myself. Nothing but stress.

When I get a familiar whiff of lilac soap, I turn around and see her standing at the nurse's station. Her hair is pulled into a tight bun under her scrub cab and I want to take the pins from it and rake through it with my fingers the same way Jasper did with his toy comb. My hair is a mess. I've pulled it up, clipped it, and can't remember the last time I washed it so just imagine how bad that must look. I have no idea or I'd tell you. I take the bottle of Tums that I've been nursing from my pocket and pop two in my mouth. I've been eating them like candy and my stomach hasn't stopped hurting yet.

Neither has the rest of me.

Erica hears the tablets in the bottle roll around together and glances up. Her eyes widen and I see the shock on her face when she gets a good look at me. I know it's bad. I've stopped looking at myself in the mirror because I want to cut my face off and flush it. That's how bad it looked the one and only time that I studied my reflection and I only did it then to see if I was really there. Joe once told me to look at my reflection and see the truth. I need to slap him. I stand there like a freak until the hallway clears a little and then I make up my mind to speak to her. I can't square my shoulders anymore because I've forgotten how and I need her to help me remember.

I need her.

"Hey," I hear myself say, walking toward her like my spine has been removed.

"Dr. Torres, perhaps you'd like to take a shower and try to look presentable before you get here tomorrow?" She closes her chart and glares at me. "You stink."

Okay. I'll let her have that one. "I'd like to talk to you if you -"

"Would you? Hmm." She tucks her chart under her arm. "Is it for a consult?"

"No."

"Well, like I told you in Miami ... I keep my professional and private lives very separate. How is your father, by the way? He was a nice patient."

"I don't know. My family won't talk to me except to say that he's home."

"Nice. I'm sure he's fine." She puts her pen back in her front pocket. "Well, you have a wonderful day."

"Erica -"

She freezes in mid spin and I see that she has no problem squaring HER shoulders. When she looks back at me it's a dead in the eyes, nostrils flaring kind of look, and there's nothing nice about it. "I spent a lot of years at school so that I could be addressed as Dr. Hahn. I'm an attending so show me a little respect and keep it formal. And find some perfume and a brush."

The Callie of a few months ago would have gotten toe to toe with her and said something just as cutting. The Callie that I've become just looks at her, nods, and walks away. I make it to the bathroom before the pain in my stomach causes me to double over and I throw up the Tums. They've become a colorful powder of rainbow and I stare at those colors the same way I stared at the rainbow sunrise in Miami the morning after I slept with Erica. She told me then that I didn't have to wear the rainbow pin or buy the gay pride bumper sticker, but that doesn't matter. It looks like I'm wearing both inside me and I'm puking up pieces of it because I can't keep it down.

I'll go home early because my stomach ache won't quit.

It will become a big theme with me.

Three days back at work and I head into my first surgery. My team has the radio blaring when I walk in ... just like old times. The patient is under and this is the part where I usually dance to the table for their amusement and bump hips with the scrub nurse as I say, "Let's rock" and she choruses with "And Roll". It's a stupid, weird, not exactly professional form of JuJu that has yet to fail me. I do it before every surgery, but when I hear the steady beat of music and watch everyone bouncing their heads in unison like we're at a concert and not about to give a guy the ability to walk without a limp, I hate them all. I turn the radio off and hear my scrub nurse gasp. "I have a headache so keep it down," I mumble.

That's a lie.

My head isn't hurting.

My head feels insanely full and mostly jumbled, but it doesn't hurt.

My stomach hurts. I forgot to buy Tums and I've eaten my way through two big bottles already. I glance at one of the interns and say, "Can you go to the clinic and find me some antacid?"

The guy nods at me and looks as if I'm depriving him of something much more amazing that watching me put a leg back together. He comes back within the hour and I step into the scrub room to take the medication. I didn't realize that Mark was standing there to watch me through the glass. I pull off my gloves, wash my hands, then kick back the antacid. It's purple. Prescription. Nexium from the looks of it. I scoop water into my palm and take a couple of sips.

"If you would eat," he says, "the acids in your stomach would settle on their own."

I don't say anything.

"You can't keep going like this, Cal. You can't. You're going to kill yourself if you don't snap out of it." He touches my hand. It's brief. "Will you just talk to me? Please? I need to hear your voice again."

I crumple the white paper cup that the pill was given to me in and toss it into the trash. I take off my surgical scrubs and wave my hand over the sensor at the sink to scrub in again. My surgery hasn't even gotten good yet and I'm well on my way contaminating the patient. I don't say anything to Mark as he helps me cover my blue scrubs with yellow surgical ones and I let him tie me into them and adjust my mask because I don't have the energy to ask anyone else to do it and he seems to believe that being near me and breathing my air will make us like we were. But it doesn't.

He has spent the last couple of weeks on a pallet right next to the sofa I claim as a bed. He wakes up every single time I wake up. He attempts to cook for only once and when the smell of it makes the both of us sick, he starts ordering takeout. He tempts me with Chinese, Pizza, Italian, but I don't touch it. I can't touch it. Eating proves that I'm alive and I don't need any reminders.

I don't speak to him as I head back into the OR and let someone slide my gloves into place.

I fix the patient's leg. Even without my juju.

He should heal beautifully.

If I could insert a pin in my heart and drill it into place ... I'd be just fine, too.

I'm in the Resident's lounge after surgery so that I can avoid the mad dash to the cafeteria. There's a sofa in the corner and I push back my chair and flop back on it. I can hear random voices on the intercom as I rest on my back and close my eyes. This is how it felt after Jasper's accident. When I came out of surgery on that day ... I woke up alone. I was twenty years old, but I was terrified and a nearby doctor had come and consoled me, patting me on the arm with his gnarled hand. He told a nurse to find my parents, but they didn't arrive until I was already out of recovery and in a private room. The silence made me want to claw my ears out to see if they were still working and I was comforted after a while by the pages I heard. I wasn't deaf, after all.

When my parents came and told me that Joel was still in surgery and that Jasper ... was here, but gone ... I wanted to be deaf.

My mother didn't cry that day. She didn't cry when I did and she didn't cry when I begged for pain medication that was late in arriving. She didn't do anything but hold my face in her palms and tell me that we would survive it. We would survive Jazz never coming back the way he was and we'd be thankful for what we had, she'd said. We would survive the inevitable lawsuit from the owner's of the other boat that took years in court and we lost anyway. We would survive. Because that's what Torres people do. They survive.

God damn that survival trait is all I can say.

Fuck survival.

I want a reason to live that isn't instinct.

"Dr. Torres?"

I think I'm imagining the silky sweetness of her voice. There's no bite, no bark right now. I open my eyes when she says it again and today ... today her hair is down and she looks just like she did in Miami when the sunlight showed every different shade of blond she possesses. "Dr. Hahn."

The serene look that I swear I saw on her face is replaced by a tightening of her lips. It causes a dimple in her chin and I want to touch that dimple so badly that I fist my hands. She looks at me like I'm a roach she needs to step on. "If you can pull yourself together long enough to work today ... I need a consult. I paged Dr. Simmons, but he hasn't responded."

Dr. Simmons is the Ortho attending and he is so old and so mean that he's probably hanging upside down in a broom closet somewhere with a still beating heart between his fangs. He tolerates me because he has to. He tolerates life because he has to. Fucker. "What do you have?"

"Forty eight year old female, unrestrained driver in a one vehicle collision with a tree. Open fractures in both wrists and she suffered a massive heart attack en route. I figure Ortho can repair the wrists while I repair the heart."

"Any internal damage?"

She cocks her head a little. "Minor."

I think she's talking about herself then. Minor damage inside while I'm mortally wounded. I push myself to my feet and grimace, a hand to my stomach. "What room is she in?"

"Trauma two." Her eyes move to my hand and her brow wrinkles. "What's wrong with you?"

"Are you asking as a doctor or a friend?"

The wrinkle fades and she narrows her eyes to slits. "I'm asking as someone who will be in the operating room with you and if you're unable to perform properly then I need to know."

"I'll perform just fine!"

"See that you do."

I watch her stalk out of the room, her hair blowing, her jacket billowing. Lilac has become my favorite scent and I breathe so deep that my lungs hurt. I can't blame her for being cruel to me. I didn't call her, I didn't speak to her after everything that we shared, I didn't let her help me. I should have leaned on her during the flight back and if I had it to do again ... I would have. If I had it to do again ... I'd tell my mother that I'm in love Erica Hahn and that there's nothing perverted about love. But there are three things in life that are guaranteed: you will die, you will pay taxes, and you will not be able to go back in time no matter how much you fuck up the big moments in your life need revision. You don't get do-overs. Life rolls from this to that and some minutes feel like hours and some feel like seconds and in the blink of an eye ... you detonate yourself.

We all self destruct sometimes.

I certainly did.

I do the consult and scrub in less than an hour after Erica found me in the Resident's lounge. It's Erica's OR and her juju is the heart tattoo on her back. I asked her about it as I let my fingers trail over her skin the first night we made love and she said that she got it after Rachel died. It was a heart that Rachel had drawn at the bottom of a letter for her that was included in her will. Erica read it two days after they buried her and she took that heart and had it put on her back and filled with red. She got it, she said, for luck. As I watched her make the incision on the woman's chest, I knew that what she didn't tell me that night is that she got that heart so that Rachel would always be with her and I swear to God, I can see the other woman clearly in my head peering over Erica's shoulder and steadying her scalpel hand with her own.

My own scalpel clatters to the floor after that visual and I wonder if I'm going crazy as the nurse hands me a fresh on and set to work. I don't do anything to call attention to myself until I finish the right wrist and move to the left. I have to stand shoulder to shoulder with Erica now. She's working on the woman's heart and I'm working on her hand and our elbows touch more often than I can count. Finally, after I nudge her a little harder than I realize, she steps back, rolls her head around to relieve tension, and says, "Do you see what I'm doing here, Dr. Torres? I'm working on a heart. One slip of the scalpel and I've killed her. You almost made me kill her just now. Could you possibly stop invading my space before you piss me off?"

There are several snickers and I feel all eyes on me. My temper suddenly roars to life like that pacing tiger just got out of jail free. "I realize that your overblown ego makes you think that cardio trumps any other medical procedure that can be performed, but I've got nerves exposed, a shattered ulna, and very thin patience so forgive me if I don't give a good god damn whether or not I 'invade your space'. It's not my fault that your head is so big you need an OR of your own just to give it breathing room."

If I dropped the pin in my hand ... it would have sounded like a gunshot when it hit the floor.

Erica is staring at me.

Actually, everyone is staring at me.

I hold my ground and insert the pin and to my absolute shock ... I'm steady and precise.

I pick up a screw and meet her eyes, clearly challenging her.

When she starts to say something ... I turn the drill on and that's the only sound in the room.

It's loud, it's overbearing, and I glare at her the entire time it's on. It's brief, but she looks away first and goes back to her precious heart.

I don't nudge her again, though.

And she finishes before me so I don't see her for the rest of the day.

Something about losing my temper and feeling fire race in my blood gives me enough of a glimpse at my former self to want it back. Another week goes by, then two, then three. I don't talk to Erica. She doesn't talk to me. I also don't talk to Cristina beyond pleasantries and most of my interaction with Mark is a series of grunts, nods, and shrugs despite the fact that I'm trying here. I call my dad's cell a few times, but it goes straight to voice mail and I wind up talking to Jasper's nurse on the house phone. She says my dad is sleeping. He doesn't call back. My phone is so silent that I find myself checking it every day to see if the battery has died and yes, I'm that asshole who calls the local movie theater to hear showtimes and am oddly comforted by the computerized voice on the other end of the line. That voice doesn't expect anything from me so I sit in my car and pretend that I'm talking to someone just to see what it feels like. I don't say anything important ... I just want to hear my own voice.

I'm still here.

I may not matter, but I'm here.

I finally call Jasper's Firefly phone five weeks after I returned from Miami. I'm over being excommunicated and I'm ready to fly back to Miami and pitch a tantrum worthy of my mother's. Jasper knows how to answer the phone, but the only number he can remember is 911 and Daddy almost took the phone from him after the cops kept randomly appearing to ask if there was a problem. After three rings, I can hear my brother breathing into the phone and say, "Jasper?"

"Hi ... Lee."

"Hi, buddy."

"Buddy ... too."

"Where's Daddy?"

"Where Yellow?"

I didn't expect him to ask about Erica. I didn't expect him to even remember her at all. "Yellow isn't here," I say. "Take the phone to Daddy."

"'Kay."

Five minutes of grunting and the shuffle, toe, heel of his clunky shoes on the hardwood and I can tell that he's nearing my parent's room. I have to smile when he opens the door and screeches in that loud, manly, but child-like voice and announces, 'Lee call home'. I don't hear my mother in the background, but I do hear my father coaxing Jasper to surrender his Firefly and he promises that he'll give it right back. Jasper protests, but just a little.

"Hello?"

"Daddy?"

"Hi, baby. I'm sorry I haven't called you. Your mother took the phone when I tried to take a business call and hasn't given it back to me. I miss you."

It could be the words. It could be the sound of his deep, rugged voice, but whichever it is ... I start to cry. He's silent on the other end and I hate myself for making him listen to me fall apart. "I miss you, too," I finally manage to gasp between sobs. "So much."

"I'm not going anywhere."

"Promise?"

"Of course I do. I feel just fine so stop that crying, mija. That wonderful friend of yours has magic hands."

No shit.

"Are you getting enough to eat?" I ask, but I don't need to. I need to change the subject and I already know that my mother has probably cooked enough to feed a fleet of starving boar hogs. I feel about as useful as tits on a boar hog now that I think about it. "Are you in any pain?"

"Your mother is feeding me enough rabbit food to make my front teeth grow and I've got plenty of pain medicine, but I don't need it. It's not that bad."

"Are you getting any exercise? Walking?"

"Honey?"

"Yeah?"

"Stop being a doctor and be my little girl."

"Okay, but that means I'll probably cry for the rest of this call."

"Something happened between you and your mother ... didn't it?"

"Why do you think that?"

"Because she cries every time I mention you and thinks that I don't notice. Which one of you do I need to be mad at?"

"Me."

"I see. Would you like to tell me what happened?"

"Not really. But - but if maybe you could tell her I'm sorry and I didn't mean to hurt her - that would help. She won't talk to me, Dad."

He's silent on the other line. When he finally speaks, he says, "Can I ask you something?"

"Yes, sir."

"And you'll tell me the truth?"

"Of course."

There's another long pause. "Are you involved with Erica? Romantically?"

I swallow hard and I know that he can hear it. My dad has a way of knowing me. It's more than just the fact that I look like his mother or that he gave me her name. He knows me. I would stand in front of him as a kid and spill my guts about anything bad I had done after he told me one time to tell him the truth. Sometimes ... I even made shit up so that I was more interesting for him. "Yes ... I was."

"I thought so. I may have been flat on my back and hooked up to enough wires to start a car, but I'm not blind. She was looking at you the way that I look at your mother. And speaking of your mother ... she has been dropping enough hints to make me question my own sexuality and hers. There were gay and lesbian fliers on the dining room table." I hear him laugh, but I don't.

He coughs on the other end of the line and groans a little. Before I can ask if he's okay, he adds, "I'm not going to judge you. I'm not. I believe that when God tells us that something is bad for us that he doesn't take it lightly. The Bible says that homosexuality is wrong and I try very hard to live by the Word and I want my children to do the same, but my Bible also tells me not to judge you and I won't. I love you. What I will say, Callie, is that I loved seeing you happy."

I'm crying so hard that I can barely breathe now. "I'm not happy now."

"Yes, I can hear that. Hold on one second."

"Okay."

One second becomes three and three becomes a full minute, then two. I don't know if a Firefly phone has a mute button, but I think it must because I don't hear anything but dead air. When four minutes go by, I get worried and I'm tempted to hang up and call again, but before I can make the decision to do that .. my mother is on the phone.

"Calliope?"

"Yeah?"

Silence. Again that fucking deep, dark silence that pulls you in and rips your guts apart.

"If you need to call again ... then you can call my cell phone or the house phone. I'll answer it."

"Thank you."

"And ... I'm sorry for the things I said to you even thought I really meant it when I said that I don't want you to bring her back here. This - this is your home and it always will be."

"Dad's forcing you to say this, huh?"

"Pretty much, but I was ready to say it. You've scarred me for life. I can't open your bedroom door without seeing things that I don't want to see, and I may never like blond hair on anyone again, but I - I'm here. I'm just not okay with this."

"I know."

"I'm not going to be okay with it."

"I know that, too."

"But ... I'm also not going to pretend that your ... choice ... changes the fact that you're my daughter. I love you."

"I love you, too."

"Here's your father."

I close my eyes and see her thrusting that stupid alien green kid's phone back at him with a look of pure contempt on her face. I can see her putting her hands on her ample hips, her lips puckering angrily like someone slipped a lemon into mouth without her permission, and I can see her whirl on the spot and stalk out the door so that my dad won't think he won the war. She's still walking. She's not wounded. She can leave him on the battlefield.

"Callie?"

"Yeah, dad?"

"Is that better?"

"It's getting there."

Mark wakes me up before dawn the next day. I open my eyes when something tickles my nose and can hear Cristina grumbling about the ungodly hour of morning for visits. I glance at him and he holds up the ugliest stuffed bear I've ever seen in my life. It's holding a blackboard in its dingy looking paws and Mark has written 'waffles?' on it. He hasn't tried to convince me to sleep with him. All he does is incessantly tell me that he loves me and that he didn't cheat on me. It's become as common to hear him say that as it is to hear him say my name. He sleeps over a lot, stretched out on the floor and I've felt his fingers on my face more than once while he thinks I'm out of it. That's really the only time he touches me. He thinks he hurt me like George did and he saw first hand that one strong wind, or a touch, could shatter me. So, he stays just close enough for me if I need him, but far enough away that I don't.

I look from the bear to his face and he has finally shaved properly. He has that perfect, sexy stubble that makes him look purposefully and meticulously well groomed, but just shaggy enough not to be anal about it. When he first moved into his swanky apartment ... I sat on the sink to watch him shave and he kissed me, getting cream all over my face. We had sex right there, his razor forgotten, with one of my legs over his shoulder. It took both of us to clean all the shaving cream up. I still don't know how it got all over the toilet.

I ignore the bear in favor of touching his face. He looks like Mark again. It dawns on me that I've hurt two people more than I ever thought possible. I hurt them both in different ways, but the fact that I abandoned them both ties them together. That bow that unites them is just as ugly as the one around the bear's neck. "You missed a spot," I lie, scratching his cheek.

"I was in a hurry." He grins at me and his eyes twinkle in the glow from dim light in the kitchen. "So, waffles?"

"Okay."

"Yeah?" He's shocked.

"Sure."

Mark Sloan looks at me with the wide eyed joy that Jasper reserves for the dolphins that dance on his ceiling every night. He hands me the bear and touches my hair. It's clean and curly and I wonder if maybe Cristina told him that I actually joked with her last night after I soaked in the tub for an hour. Because she looked hopeful then. And he looks hopeful now. I smooth the garish bow that has been tied around the bear's neck and smile down at it. "Did you really think this was cute, Sloan?"

"Well, no, but it was either the ugly bear or a singing telegram and Yang would have kicked my ass for that."

I lean forward and impulsively hug him. He's big. He's very, very big. His shoulders are broad, his muscles ripple under his skin, and he holds me so tight that it makes me wonder if maybe he has lost something in his life that makes him hang on too long like Erica does. We stay that way until he sits back and studies my face. "You've lost weight, Cal."

I don't mention that the pain in my stomach has become the one thing I depend on. It burns. It rumbles. It makes me feel like I swallowed flame, but forgot to chase it with water. It feels like hell, to put it mildly, and it wakes me up at night. I don't mention that the depression I've felt didn't really have anything to do with whether he did or did not have sex with some random nurse ... hey, at least he bought her dinner ... and I don't mention that I'm comparing him to a woman. Because that's not fair. He's trying to turn over a new leaf for me and I don't need to pull out the leaf blower just yet.

I get dressed, but I don't bother with makeup. I don't bother with trying to conceal that my eyes looked bruised or care that my cheekbones are accented without blush now. Since the day that my dad went into the hospital ... I've lost thirty pounds. I'm not counting. I don't really care.

When we walk to the car, he puts his arm around my shoulders and I have to keep myself from brushing it off. This is what he does. I know that. This is affection for him. This is holding my hand, Sloan style. He opens the car door for me and I nearly groan from the cheesiness of it all. I bet if I could ... I'd find out that he has rented every pathetic romantic movie he could find to try and woo me ... and took notes. When he starts the engine and turns the radio on, I see him look at me out of the corner of his eye when he presses play.

I brace myself.

'When A Man Loves A Woman' by Michael Bolton fills the interior of the car.

I look straight ahead. He starts to hum along and I have to pull both of my lips inward to keep from laughing. I finally can't take it another second and hit the forward button. God, it's even worse. I skip over 'Hello', by Lionel Ritchie after the first few notes, then skip over Air Supply, Foreigner, and Journey in quick succession. When Olivia Newton John starts to warble that she honestly loves me ... I. Could. Die. I laugh. I laugh so hard that I have to clutch my sides and come very close to peeing in my pants when I realize what he's done. The fool has burned a CD of love songs and when I inspect a little further and hear Dolly Parton, in her twang, talk about 'Islands in The Stream' .. there are tears of undiluted mirth streaming down my face. I can barely breathe. I'm laughing so hard that I could swallow my tongue and not even notice.

This is Mark Sloan! Mark! Sloan! And he's trying to woo me! I feel like we're in an old fashioned courtship.

Complete with a soundtrack that would make Baby Jesus cry.

"I'm so glad that my efforts amused you," he tells me, smiling my way at a red light.

I take off my seatbelt, lean across the console, and kiss him on the cheek.

I don't even notice that his beard is rough against my face.

Maybe I'm getting over her. Maybe. Maybe this is God's way of telling me that he knows I dabbled, but now he's sending a man my way to prove that dabble is all I did. Maybe Mark and I are meant to have a Trevor, a house, a life. I don't know what it means, but I enjoy his company the way I did before Erica came into the picture. He changes the words of 'Islands in the Stream' to make it perverted and I don't even roll my eyes when he tells me to let him open my car door. When he extends his hand and I step out, he hugs me in the open door and kisses the top of my head. I feel his gratitude that I've let him in this far and the silent wish that I'd let him in all the way.

I can only do so much, though.

I hug him back and ask him to change the words to 'When a Man Loves a Woman'.

He doesn't disappoint.

He keeps me laughing while we order.

My laughter and mood quickly go south when I've eaten half of my waffle. It feels like someone has punched me in the stomach with all that they had ... no ... no that's an understatement. It feels like someone has fired a cannon from two feet away and the ball hit me there. I'm doubled up in pain and when I try to stand, I vomit blood. I would lay my hand on a stack of Bibles and swear that there's a pitchfork rammed down my throat. It scares me, but it freaks Mark out so badly that he yanks the table out of the way and attempts to be a doctor and not a man when he yells at someone to call 911. I roll onto my side on the uncomfortable bench seat and throw up again and again ... I can see blood. Red blood, brown blood, blood that looks like coffee grinds, and the pitchfork continues to assault me. He's spackled with it, but if he notices, he doesn't say a thing.

He leaves his car at the diner in favor of riding in the ambulance with me. When the EMT can't find my vein, Mark takes over and expertly inserts the IV into the back of my hand. He takes it upon himself to give me something for the pain and I'm crying too hard to say thank you. It's not enough. It's not nearly enough and as the ambulance streaks for Seattle Grace with the sirens blaring, I'm clutching at my stomach and trying to draw my knees upward to no avail. Mark unstraps me from the stretcher and helps me sit up, he pulls my legs upward himself and I can hear him telling the EMT to shut the fuck up, to not talk to him about policy, and I lean my head against his shoulder.

I think about his cheddar romantic gestures and his dance to 'It's Raining Men' months before. I think of him telling me to leave my clothes in his closet and trying to physically restrain me from taking four pairs of jeans back to Cristina's. I think about how he rolled them up, put them under his pillow, then flopped down on the bed to keep me from getting them. He never asked me to move in with him ... but now ... I think it was his way of inviting me. He's not a wordsmith. He could never be accused of being in touch with his feminine side. He's not a lot of things.

But he's here.

And if I have to die ... his arms around me could very well be the last thing I ever feel.

It suits me just fine.

The medication he gives me in the ambulance eventually goes to my head. By the time we reach Seattle Grace (and again Mark has mastered the sweeping gesture because he freaking CARRIES ME IN) I'm not crying nearly as bad and the pain has been dulled enough to feel like a handle and not a blade. I'm still covered in blood and the taste of it is enough to inspire my gag reflex to stand up and dance the hula, but I keep it together. I keep it together even when I hear him bellow for someone to page Webber, stat. I keep it together when I feel someone cut away my shirt, and I'm still keeping it together until I smell lilacs and I know that she's there. I know that it's her hand on my forehead, brushing back my hair. I know that it's her fingers taking my pulse and her stethoscope between my breasts. I hear her asking what happened and I feel her fingers against my stomach, pressing, prodding, and I want to not hurt anymore so that I can enjoy it.

But I don't.

I come up screaming when she hits a particularly sensitive spot and she moves her hands away ... which hurts more.

I try to flinch away from the people who are taking off my shoes and I can't not move, even though Mark tells me to, as someone cuts my pants off. The pain comes back with a renewed effort and more blood comes spewing out my mouth and nose. Someone says my blood pressure is low, which, big shock, Sherlock ... do I even have any left?

I hate interns.

I'm vaguely aware that Webber has arrived because his booming, authoritative voice is actually louder than the pain I'm in. I hear him bark out orders and tell someone to bring Morphine. I can't be examined in the state I'm in and I can't not be in this state. I can't stop begging for someone, anyone, to kill me. I can't suck it up. The medication burns when it goes into my vein. I haven't opened my eyes.

That will burn worse.

Because Erica's going to be looking at me like she looked at the little girl who screamed the entire time she was in the trauma room with a broken bone. She's going to be looking at me like I need a muzzle, like I'm a big baby, like she doesn't know what she was thinking when she messed around with me. I'm not the strong woman she thought I was. I don't have any super powers. I'm human. I am the human who hurt her.

I don't look at anything except the back of my eyelids and eventually ... eventually the darkness pulls me deeper.


	5. Chapter 5

Things that are cheesy:

Mark's taste in music.

George and Izzie being in lurrrve.

Derek Shepherd's hair.

And Jasper's favorite food ... Cheetos.

That's what I smell when dark turns to light and I blink a couple of times. My brother's face is about five inches from mine and he's crunching on Cheetos as he stares at me intently. When he sees my eyes open he stops crunching, swallows the mouth full of goo, and grins at me. His teeth are orange. Erica was right ... he's beautiful. I reach up and brush crumbs off his chin and then touch his nose.

"Hi ... buddy," he says, his voice slicing through my head because it's so loud and he's so close.

"Buddy, too," I reply, patting him on the chest. He gives me an Eskimo kiss, but misses my nose and rubs his on my forehead instead.

"Callie!"

That's my mom.

This is the fourth time I'll make her cry. I hope it's the last. She tells Jasper to move out of the way and practically lifts him out of the chair. Then she swoops down on me smelling vaguely of Vera Wang and my dad's aftershave and I know that she's had her head on his shoulder a lot. She kisses every inch of my face and then kisses it some more, cooing at me like I'm an ugly infant in a stroller than you go ga-ga over because it's so repulsive you feel like no one else will ... so you overcompensate for other people. Yeah, like that. While she's tucking my hair behind my ears and rubbing my cheeks ... I feel the bandage on my stomach. I hear the steady beeping of a heart monitor and I notice that my IV has been moved to the other hand. I glance at the one it had been in ... it's bruised to high hell ... despite Mark's talent. I start to say something, but my voice sounds like I swallowed a frog and my dad appears, looking thinner, but wonderful, and he holds a cup and straw up to my mouth.

I take a sip and whisper, "What happened?"

"Mark?" My mom looks behind her and steps out of the way.

Mark takes her place and the bags are back under his eyes and his beard is completely gone. He's totally smooth and I think two things at once: he's got a baby face under that scruff and I must have worried him so much that he said to hell with maintenance and got rid of it. Maybe he did it to spend more time with me. It's different. Cute. I prefer him the other way. He leans down and kisses my forehead, then my mouth. Jasper snickers in the corner and says, "Naughty naughty!"

It sounds like 'Naw-ty'.

Chuckling, Mark kisses my head again. "How do you feel?"

"How do I look?"

He makes a face. "You don't want to know."

"That's how I feel, too." I cringe when the blood pressure cuff tightens on my arm and glance to the right, where the equipment is. Heart monitor? Check. Fluid? Check. Oxygen in my nose? Check. Pain pump? Check. Panic attack? On the way. "What's wrong with me?"

"You had what is quite possibly the largest perforated ulcer Seattle Grace has ever seen. You're on antibiotics because you spilled a lot of food and digestive juices into your abdominal cavity. Dr. Hahn had to open you up pretty impressively to get all that out of you and you're still running a fever. You also wound up getting a blood transfusion because you lost so much. By the time I got you here ... you're abdominal cavity was swollen out like a woman with triplets." He looks down at me, showing his perfect white teeth. "They wouldn't let me help, but Hahn had you on the table for about four hours longer than they thought because she wanted to get every piece of the infection out."

"Why would a heart surgeon-"

"She was on call and she insisted. Thank God she did," he tells me. "I've seen the photos of the thing and you were in good hands with her. You a little piece of your stomach, but that's okay, because you're here."

I shift a little and groan, looking under the gown I'm wearing. My chest is on fire. Hmmm. "Is there a reason someone used paddles on me?"

Mark's no longer smiling. "Your heart stopped twice because your were bleeding out so fast. They wouldn't give up on you though. Neither did I."

I'd like to add to the list of cheesy things: nearly dying and only losing part of your STOMACH. Fuck. I can hear it now ... 'Hey, Callie? Heard you almost died!' 'Yep. My stomach ate a hole in itself. Woo. Aren't I impressive?' I can't even almost die from something amazing.

Shit.

Everyone is silent.

When you're a doctor and you find yourself in the bed instead of beside it, when you're in the gown instead of handing it to someone ... you get a different perspective. You get the look on your face that every patient gets just before they ask if there's something the doctors are not telling them. I got that look and asked it while I held my breath for the answer. "Anything else?"

Mark nods and for the first time since I've known him ... he takes my hand. I never realized that my hand could completely disappear in someone else's. His hand is HUGE. If he tells me I have cancer ... I'm gonna die. No pun intended. "Just the fact that we are going to take turns kicking your ass when you get out of this bed. You ignored this, Callie. You were in a lot of pain and didn't tell us."

"Oooh!" Jasper puts a hand over his mouth and points at Mark. "Ass! Ass! Ass!"

"That's right, Jasper," I say, smiling with relief. "Mark's an ass."

Jasper continues to chant the word as Mark leans down and kisses me again. He runs his thumb along my cheek and agrees, "I am an ass. But I'm in love so I'm allowed to be."

I swear ... my mother swoons.

I laugh when she ruffles Mark's hair then cringe as pain flames through the incision. How weird, I think, that Erica silently explored and tasted each of my scars ... and then gave me one herself.

Would it ever fade?

Recovering from major surgery is a bitch and I never want to cut a person open again. It hurts. I'm frustrated by the second day and bordering on channeling Sybil on the third. I need help getting out of bed and then back in. Every step I take makes me feel like I was put together using scraps and those scraps are being pulled apart one stitch at a time. Webber says that I have to walk in the hallway and my dad is there for that, pulling my IV beside him while he supports my weight. Which, incidentally, my weight loss became the fifth time I have made my mother cry. She helped me into a fresh cotton gown, saw my ribs, and broke down.

She thinks she caused it. Then she channeled Sybil herself and blamed me, Erica, and my job in quick succession. When she ran out of fingers to point, she told Richard she was cooking for me and he didn't say no. I know my mother ... I'm sure she already has the entire hospital staff jumping through her hoops.

On my fourth day, Mark sat down on the bed with me and says, "I know about you and Erica."

This is how my reaction sounds in my head: ZOMGWTFBBQSTFU!!

This is what came out of my mouth, "Oh?"

I'm obviously a wordsmith too.

Mark nods. "Your mom-"

OH, NO SHE DI-ENT!!

"- she told me about the argument you had with Erica about your father's treatment in Florida. Hahn comes across strong and I know you love your dad, but I'm sure she had his best interest at heart so ... maybe you should talk to her again. She stands out there in the hallway so much that Richard threatened to put a chair there for her."

What. The. Fuck.

Clearly my mother is a wordsmith and compulsive liar.

"Also," Mark continues and I'm glad because it means he doesn't notice the confusion on my face. "Don't freak out, but-"

"Okay, rule number one ... don't preface anything with 'don't freak out' because that means freaking out is my FIRST instinct."

"What's rule number two?"

"If you say something that freaks me out ... I'll kick your ass. With or without the disclaimer."

He has a nice laugh and I realize that it sounds foreign to me. He took the dark road with me for a while. My voice nearly died from lack of use and his laugh did the same.

"Well," he says. "Yang told your parents that you live with me and she got Meredith to help her take your things to my place and unpacked it all because-"

"I'm evicted!?" I cry. "What kind of ass-hattery is that?!"

"I don't think she evicted you ... I just think the mental image of Lori Anne flaying the skin off her for the mess in the apartment and the couch you've been sleeping on kicked her sense of self preservation into overdrive." He wrinkles his nose. "I got the wraith instead. I don't think I've heard the end of your mother's tirade about empty cabinets and nothing but beer in the fridge. She actually pulled my ear so hard that I got Derek to examine it."

This is my mother's wet dream. Me, living with a guy ... even if it's sin. She probably looks at Mark like he's the guardian of my vagina's heterosexuality and if she only knew just how dirty I get with him ... she would pull way more than his ear. I broke my mother in Miami so I make the decision here and now to let her dream. I make the decision to LIVE her dream.

Hell, I may as well. I can't live mine.

"I'm still not gonna sleep with you," I eventually tell him. "Whether I go home with you or go to a hotel. I'm just ... not sleeping with you."

His jaw tightens for the briefest moment, then he nods once. "I don't make it a habit of taking advantage of invalids."

"I am not an invalid!"

"Prove it, baby. Walk with me in the hall because the stronger you get the faster we can go home."

He called me 'baby'. He said 'home'.

And my heart does a gymnastics routine in my chest that would have won the gold, bronze, and silver because it was that damn impressive. I let him put slippers on my feet and maneuver the IV into the corridor. That's how I wind up seeing Erica ... and that's when my heart stood still. She is standing at the surgical board with her arms crossed over her chest. Her skin is flawless and if she is having trouble with not being in my life ... I can't tell. I see her smile at something Webber says to her and I want to run the other way, but my body is saying 'fuck you'. My body wants me to move closer. My nose wants me to breathe her in. My hands want to touch her. My mouth wants to taste her. And I want her to be the one walking with me. I want her to proclaim to everyone in the world that she loves me, that I'm hers.

I hesitate when Mark leads me provocatively close to her and I stumble because I've tried to stand still and he keeps going.

It's Erica who steadies me. She grips my arm, hanging onto me and I clutch at her white jacket. Ahh, there it is. The dimple in her chin from pursing her lips. The line between her eyes that tells me she's worried. The lilac garden that I want to run through for the rest of my life. There it is. There she is. It's the span of seconds, but it feels like an eternity as I look at her. I see us in Florida. I see us on the jet ski. I see her sitting next to me on a piece of driftwood while she told me about her life. I see us walking on the beach and her thumb rubbing a seashell with a look of awe. I see her pale legs turning pink and her laughing that I should call her Casper. I see her shutting my bedroom door and breathing life into me with every touch, every word, every gasp of pleasure.

I took her to the beach for the first time ... she took me home.

"You okay?" she asks, still clutching me.

I nod. "Yeah ... it's just hard to get around ... after you've been gutted."

I mean that literally. She gutted me in surgery, but she GUTS me every day. I watch her glance at Mark and what she says next is shocking. "I've got her. Why don't you take a hike and let me help her?"

"Because I am helping her, you freakin' vulture."

She smiles at him. "Better to be a vulture than the shit it leaves behind."

"Ha ha," he snaps, but he's smiling.

"It's fine," I tell him. "I need to talk to her."

Mark kisses me on the mouth, shoots her a bird, and heads back down the hall. I stiffen, but he doesn't notice. She does and gives me a little smile Erica takes his spot, looping her arm through mine and pushing the IV. Her thumb rubs the underside of my arm and I come even closer to death than I did a few days ago. I don't want her to stop. At all. I purposely stumble to make her tighten her grip and she changes her angle, clasping my hand for added support. We make two rounds in the hallway before we say another word. On our third lap ... she guides me into a deserted Quiet Room where we take people after their loved one has died. There's no television, but there are plush, comfortable chairs as if the comfort of your ass can somehow impact the hole in your heart. When she closes the door behind her, I watch her with a sense of hopelessness. And hope. I watch her struggle with awkwardness and want to wrap myself in up in that awkwardness and tell her we're kindred spirits that way.

"You almost died on me." Her voice is as shaky as my legs. She regards me from head to toe ... as if she's afraid she'll see through me and realize she left me lying dead on the operating table. "Don't do it again."

I don't even fight the urge to move forward and hug her. I can't. I have to. I have to feel her, smell her, hold onto her. She hugs me back and I start to cry. I whisper, "I miss you," against her hair.

"Oh, Callie -"

"I really, really miss you." I hang on to her tighter. I've seen videos of people who cling to trees to avoid being carried downstream in a flood. That's how I hold her ... like she can save me from the storm. Like she already did. "I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. I handled everything wrong and-"

"Shhh." She puts her hand on the back of my head and strokes my hair. I feel her shake. She's in the same flood I am. "I miss you, too."

"I can't stand it when you're mad at me."

"I'm mad at the circumstances. Not you." She backs away and rubs a tear off my face. "Never you."

"You told me I stink!"

"Well, you did." She gives me a lopsided grin. "And you told me I have an overblown ego."

"Well, you do." I smile back at her. "I don't want to fight with you any more."

"Me either." She looks all over my face before she speaks again. "You're moving in with Mark, huh? I - I get it. I get that your mother is somewhere over the moon about him. And you. I - I watched them have lunch together today. For just a second. Your mom loves him."

"Yeah."

"Do you?"

"I don't know." That's the honest to God truth in three little words. I don't know. I love the idea of him. I love that my family loves him. I love that he called me baby and made a stupid ass CD to try to fix what he didn't break, but thought he had. I love that he loves me ... or thinks he does.

"Here's the thing," she tells me, tucking her hair behind her ear. She crosses her arms over her chest and I can see her pick her words carefully. "I'm a big girl. I can handle this. I can handle watching him be the person I want to be. I can be kind enough to bite my tongue and not tell you to pick me because I know that your family won't accept that and you love them. What I can't do ... is give up my best friend so I'm begging you to let me be THAT person again. I'm asking you to let me back in, Callie. I won't ask for anything more than that."

"You never stopped being in." My chin trembles and I can feel the tightening of my lips as I fight to not cry. I lose that fight. "And what you didn't ask me ... is if I love you. Because if you had asked me ... I'd tell you that I am IN love with you and you're all I think about and you're all I want, but I can't ... do that ... because you were wrong in Miami ... I have to buy the bumper sticker and wear the pin because I can't do it halfway, Erica. I can't live in a closet and I can't live out of it ..." I sob now. "So ... I have to live without you as my lover and accept you as my friend because the alternative is nothing at all ... and I'm only happy when I'm with you."

She's crying too. We circle each other without moving at all and she is so pretty with tears staining her resolve and her lips trembling that I can't stand it. I lean forward and kiss her. I hang onto her face with my hands and put so much into it that I'll need oxygen when I get back to my room, but that's not important. What's important is the fact that this is like our first kiss ... our cheeks were wet with rain then and now they're wet with sadness and confusion and want and maybe a little regret because this should be a make up kiss, but it tastes like goodbye. My tongue is against hers, our breasts are pushed together, and she's so gentle with me, so undemanding, that I sob against her lips and pull away. I only stay gone long enough to let her dry my tears and then she kisses me and that kiss ... that one ends with a whispered 'I'm sorry' from both of us at the same time.

It won't be goodbye.

But we don't know it right now.

What we know is that we are stealing pieces of each other in that moment that we will never return. We're taking enough of what might have been to dull the razor sharp edges of what really is and we're telling ourselves that we can live like this because something has to be better than nothing and something is all we can share. We'll tell ourselves and each other a lot of things eventually. We don't know that either, though. So the finality of this moment is the choking kind. It's a coffin of hope that we dug the grave for with our bare hands. It's a coffin that we've already wasted our bodies in and we hide it together ... but we can't throw the dirt in yet. We can't cover it completely because we both see it. We both know it was real.

I let my fingers trail through the ends of her hair and meet her eyes. I mouth the words 'I love you' because it can't be said out loud. It can't be spoken again and while it was a silent admission ... my heart is all the way in it. My heart is singing it.

Her eyes fill with tears again when she mouths it back to me ... 'I love you' ... her lips form the words slowly, looking pouty and perfect and I can see her crooked bottom tooth and I love her for it. I love her for not being the prettiest on the outside because it made her insides so gorgeous that it blinds me.

I watch her take a deep, steadying breath and I do the same. She stops crying after a while and extends her hand. "Hi, I'm Dr. Hahn, but you call me Erica."

I put my hand in hers. "Callie."

"Callie," she replies, gripping it in a firm handshake. "You don't know it yet ... but you just met your best friend and I am going to value that for the rest of my life."

We hold on longer than a best friend should, but it's not long enough. It can never be long enough. It can never be.

I look at our hands ... white against caramel ... and I know that I will go through the rest of my life searching for what I found right here. It makes me not want to live at all.

When we walk into the hallway and see Mark talking to my parents ... she doesn't say anything else. They look down the hall at us and when I turn my head ... she's gone.

My mother looks furious and stalks down the corridor to meet me. She grabs the IV and says, "What did she want?"

"She's my doctor. She wanted to hear how I'm doing."

"Mmhmm. And you're feeling so bad that you need to cry, huh?" Mom grips my arm so tightly that I hiss. She doesn't let up. "You were hysterical when you called and told me that your husband cheated on you. Do not do that to Mark. He shouldn't have to pay for George's mistakes and you should know better than to make him."

"Mark and I were broken up when I ... slept with Erica."

"Well, you're not broken up now so unless you want me to go to jail ... leave that woman alone."

"We're friends."

"Well, hot damn. Slap my ass and call me happy," she replies. "You don't need a friend with benefits when you've got a man like Mark Sloan."

"Mom-"

"I mean it, Calliope. Do not look at what's behind you ... look what lies ahead."

I look.

Mark is now talking to Jasper and he's letting him play with his stethoscope. That stethoscope is Mark's prized possession. His grandmother gave it to him for graduation. He won't leave it at the hospital overnight. He always tucks it back into the monogrammed case it came in and puts it on the table beside his bed. Jasper handles the steth like he handles everything else ... clumsily. I take it from my brother and quickly snatch an ace bandage from a nearby cart before he howls in protest. The ends of the bandage have Velcro on it and that will amuse him for hours. He looks at the shiny stethoscope and back at the bandage and I can tell he wants to protest, but I say his name like a warning and he doesn't. He face falls only briefly and then he smiles at me.

"He'll break this," I tell Mark, handing the stethoscope back to him. "He doesn't know that it's valuable."

"That's okay," Mark replies. "I've got something now to take its place if it gets broken."

That does it.

I shit you not ... if I find out who gave him the Handbook to a Woman's Heart ... I will kill that person for days.

FOR DAYS!!

Days are what I spend in the hospital. Ten to be exact. I develop a minor infection that prevents anyone from visiting too long at a time. At night, when my family goes to their hotel room ... Erica comes to see me and she doesn't put a time limit on her visits. She's Best Friend Erica v2, new and improved. We play checkers and Battleship and she always lets me win. We play online Jeopardy on her laptop with her sitting next to me, her shoulder against mine. I don't win that one. She's smart as HELL and while I can hold my own ... her brain has so much information in it that I can't keep up. She know things ... so much trivia and interesting factoids that we talk about random shit until sunrise a lot of the time and then she leaves before visitors are technically allowed to arrive.

We laugh so much that she takes my stitches out before I can pop them. I watch her work. Her hands flutter like butterflies over my skin and I think, as I watch her move, that those hands were the butterflies in my stomach, too. The scar that has been left behind is straight and the stitches were done with care. I'll wear that scar for the rest of my life and I think it's beautiful. Long, precise, and her handiwork. This is why she is at the top of her game, why she's demanded by people. Only she can mark a body with a scalpel and make you want to own her mark.

On the tenth day, she signs my release before my parents arrive and squeezes my hand. "If anything starts to feel odd ... you tell me."

"I will."

"Call me? Even to not tell me."

"Definitely."

She doesn't kiss me.

I hear our hearts touch without our lips touching at all.

Mark's apartment gets a thorough makeover courtesy of Lori Anne Torres. When I get to his place (I can't call it home yet), there are flowers and plants all over the place and oversized art on the walls. Oriental rugs cover blocks of hardwood and a photo of Mark and me at Joe's has been blown up and is hanging over the fireplace. I feel like I have amnesia and the strangers around me are trying to cut new shapes in their world so that the square peg that is me will fit. I feel like I'm walking into a life that I don't remember or really want, but I need people right now so I accept these as my own. I don't wear my skin well, however. I want to be in someone else's.

My mother takes over the kitchen and I don't join them for dinner even though I feel up to it. I let Mark pick me up and ease me onto the sleigh bed he bought for me when we shopped. It's not his taste. Maybe he doesn't fit in his skin, too. My dad brings me a tray of food. I see that there are two plates on it and he sits down on the foot of the bed, tray between us. He takes my hands in his and lowers his head to pray.

He blesses the food, he blesses me, and he thanks God that I lived. He also asks God to give me wisdom and strength and happiness.

I don't say 'amen'.

God is aware of what makes me happy.

He gave it to me and His word pulled it away.

I am mad. Pissed as hell.

That night, when my parents leave, Mark helps me bathe. I tell him that I'm fine on my own but he refuses to leave me alone. He sets the temperature in the shower and helps me take off my clothes. He bathes me the same way I bathe Jasper. He goes through the motions and looks without seeing me. I can't decide if I'm insulted or grateful. He washes my hair and finally smiles down at me. "How you holding up?"

"Good."

He takes the shower head down and rinses my hair. When the water runs clean he returns it to the hook and cradles my head in his hands. Now he is REALLY looking at me. I squirm under his scrutiny. "Mark?"

"I want to sleep in the bed with you. I'll go to the sofa if you insist, but I want to hang onto you. I ... I almost lost you twice ... once for something I didn't do and once for something I did."

"What do you mean?"

"I did not cheat on you and I did not help you when you were sick, baby. I added to it."

"No, you didn't."

His face says that he doesn't believe me and he keeps staring at me. I never realized how deep his eyes are. "I need to feel you tonight. No pressure. You're not up to anything else and I want to be with you in case you need me."

I quickly learn in that moment that I can go either way with Mark. I can go from not wanting him to touch me to begging him to. I can go from resenting him for being there to counting my lucky stars that he is. I can love him and hate him at the same time. Right now? I love him. When he dries my skin and slips a gown over my head that I want to strangle my mother for (pale yellow with pink flowers! Ack!), I lean my head against his chest and listen to his heartbeat.

I let him hold me that night.

We don't touch sexually. We don't even joke about sex like we usually do. He pulls me against his chest and I wait to see if he will take the hand that is resting on his muscular stomach. He doesn't. My hand lies there like a fish out of water that struggled to breathe for as long as it could ... then said goodbye. There's something so final about it lying there alone that makes me want to cry. Here I am ... with a man who swears he loves me ... and all I feel is lost. And alone. And not grateful to have him like I should be.

He puts on hand behind his head and rubs my waist with his thumb. He doesn't sigh with contentment and I wonder if hanging on to me isn't what he thought it would be. I wonder is he knows that to truly hang onto me ... he would have to put his leg through mine, roll into me, hold one of my hands while the other massages my back, and his blue eyes won't look away until my brown ones close ... because THAT is hanging onto me. This one armed hug that he has perfected is devoid of real emotion.

At least to me.

"Mark?"

"Yeah?"

"I'll move back to Cristina's when my parents leave."

Now ... now he rolls into me. He faces me, his head on the pillow a few inches from mine. "I'd rather you didn't."

"But-"

"I like who I am with you. I like your family the same way I like Derek's, I like to hear you laugh, I like the thought of going to bed and waking up with you ... and I love you. If you tell me what else you want from me ... I'll do it."

"I think you're confusing comfortable with love. I think you like me and you're in love with the idea of love but -"

He stiffens, uncoils from me, and sits up. I watch him swing his legs over the edge of the bed and push myself up behind him. When I touch his shoulder ... he moves it a little. Without looking at me, he says, "You want to know who that woman was that I met in the on call room, Callie? She's a nurse who had breast cancer two years ago. They took off one breast and left one. And she was embarrassed by her body so she didn't want anyone to know that she was seeing a plastic surgeon. I examined her in the on call room and I had dinner with her and her husband and her son to discuss her options. And I wanted you there the whole time because what I had to tell her is that I felt a lump in her remaining breast during her exam. And the day you broke up with me ... I had to go tell her that the cancer was back. So, if you want to hold that against me ... if you want to not believe me and think that I'm nothing ... then fuck you. I'm not apologizing for it any more."

He grabs his pillow and storms out of the room.

I keep sitting there until I can't take it.

When I go into the living room he's sitting on the couch and his head is in his hands. I sit down on the coffee table and my knees go between his. "You should have told me," I whisper.

"I tried. You don't listen to me."

"I'm listening now."

He raises his head and looks at me. "When I tell you that I love you ... it's because I do. Why won't you let me?"

"I'm trying."

"Can you try a little harder?"

I feel myself nod and he slips off the sofa and pulls my knees apart, moving between them. He doesn't do it sexually ... he does to hold me as close as he can while he kisses me. It's a kiss that brutalizes me with promise and relief and love. All his feelings ... not really mine.

When I look at him and tell him not to hurt me ... I'm really telling him that I'm hurt enough and the smallest possible infraction on his part will cut me wide ... but he doesn't hear that. He hears my surrender and takes me back to bed. This time he spoons against my back and I feel him breathing on my neck for hours.

It won't be the last sleepless night I spend in his arms.

My parents go home two weeks later. Jasper doesn't understand why I keep hugging him and it becomes a game of who can cling the longest. I take him to the windows and watch him press his palms and nose against the glass while he babbles about 'hairpanes'. My parents are talking to Mark near the baggage claim. I watch them, knowing they're talking about me, and Jasper looks back at them with me. We both see a woman walk through the airport with hair like Erica's. I gasp and come undone ... but he says, "Hi, Yellow! Hi!!"

"That's not her," I tell him. I'm relieved that it's not. If she flew out of my life ... I wouldn't have one.

He frowns and points at the woman, then takes my hand and holds it up like I just knocked someone out in the rink "Yellow!! Come hold Lee!"

God ... he remembers that night on the beach when I held her hand and he came ashore for us to hold his. We stood there like The Three Stooges ... or maybe The Three Musketeers ... hands clasped in an unholy trinity against the world. One lesbian, one little boy, and one confused woman who loved them both beyond the telling of it.

A woman who still does.

"Wrong?" Jasper asks me, his fingers touch my eyelash before the tears fall. For someone so unaware of so much, he sees all of me. He always has. The night before I left for college ... he was eight years old, unhurt, and he climbed in my bed to ask me if I was going to ever come back. I was eighteen and he was my favorite person alive. I assured him that I'd not only be back ... I'd be back all the time and find a way to let him come see me. He never did get to visit me. I wish that I had broken rules and let him stay in the dorm with me for a weekend. Because that would have been as close as he would have come to college with a clear head. And I would have shared a little bit of the world with him that I can't share now. He wouldn't remember it .. but oh ... I would. For the rest of my life. I watch him touch his own eye now and he says, "Why cry?"

I could tell him anything. I could tell him a million and one anythings that he wouldn't know or understand, but he'll care. Because I'm still his big sister and he's still not embarrassed to adore me. I look at his large, brown eyes and say, "I love Yellow."

"I love Yellow," he repeats and I know it's his truth as much as mine. Jasper has had the same nurse for fourteen years and he remembers her only occasionally. It took Erica just a few days to impact him. She's a sledgehammer. In a good way. "Love good."

"Love is good," I agree.

Only it's not.

There are enough stories written about star-crossed, forbidden lovers to fill up the Congressional Library. There are endless pieces of literature about the subject that have existed since men could chisel on stone. I think. I wasn't actually there for that and like I said ... Yellow is the one with all the trivia rolling around in her head. All I know is that loving her is wrong to so many people that it shouldn't feel right ... but it does. And I'm pretty sure that country songs have been written about that. I shudder to think.

"Yellow lost?" Jasper points toward where the woman vanished into the crowd.

"Just to me. And ... maybe herself."

"Tag! You it!" He gooses me. "You find Yellow."

He hurts my stomach, but I don't let on. I goose him back and say, "No, you're it."

He covers his eyes and counts to one.

Repeatedly.

He's still doing it when they board the plane.

I'm counting to one, too.

Only one.

On the nights that Mark works late or all night ... I invite Erica over. She tells me the first time she visits that the apartment doesn't suit me. What she means is that my life doesn't suit me and I don't disagree. We rent movies, eat popcorn, and drink wine until she realizes that I'm still taking pain meds. She pours the wine out, asks me if I'm still hurting, and offers to examine me. I confess that I'm not and that the pills just help me sleep. When I tell her that ... she flushes them down the toilet and tells me to read a boring story before bed. I know why she does it. She doesn't want to see her mother in me.

We don't talk about Mark and she purses her lips, but doesn't comment on the photo of us above the mantle. It was taken before she came into my life and I've only ever smiled that way again with her and she knows it. We talk about deep, meaningful things and things as trivial as whether or not Spiderman could beat up Superman. We agree to disagree on all things comic related and she cooks so often that I eventually gain ten of the thirty pounds I lost. She doesn't ask me if I'm sleeping with Mark and when she does my six week post surgery exam ... she makes it clear that I can return to ALL normal activity. She doesn't meet my eyes when she says it and I'm glad.

For the six weeks since surgery ... Mark has been the perfect boyfriend. He tells me about his day, bitches about Derek and Meredith's relationship and the impact it has on Derek, and he convinces me to tell him all about what happened to Jasper. When he asks me about Joel ... I tell him we're not close and that's true. My mother told my big brother about Erica and he still won't talk to me. I don't mention that. I let Mark think that the boating accident ruined our relationship.

Mark tells me about his absentee workaholic parents who loved money more than they loved him. He shows me photos of himself in high school and he's so gorgeous in that movie star way that some teenagers have that I know I would have hated him back then. He wore his football jersey with a cocky smirk and the girl he took to prom was Miss Perfection. They looked like poster people for All American Apple Pie. I can't help but think that I don't measure up ... that he settled for me because I'm more gullible than Addison was when he offered her his love.

I like being with Mark. Despite our differences ... we have a lot in common. He thinks Superman could kick Spiderman's ass like I do and after he watches Daredevil ... and when we get near the park ... he coaxes me to play fight with him on the see-saw like in the movie and we fall into the sand together because neither of us can balance for shit. It's fun. He's fun. I laugh a lot with him and when I get the go ahead to return to work ... he starts to flirt, but he doesn't press. I know he wants me ... I can feel it at night when he rubs against me.

On my first official day back at Seattle Grace there is a nine car pileup on the freeway that fills our trauma bay with so many patients that we have to divert several to Mercy West. I stay busy through lunch and well into the evening and then crash in the on call room. Mark wakes me up by slipping into the bed with me. He nuzzles my neck and hands me a red rose. I bring it to my nose and breathe deep as his hand goes under my shirt. He watched me climb on a table today and realign someone's hip so he knows that I am one hundred and twelve percent healthy.

My pulse quickens when he moves higher and strokes the top of my breasts. My bra fastens in the front and with a quick flick of his fingers ... he opens it and rubs my nipple. He takes the rose from my hand and trails it over that peak, then lets it drop to the floor behind him. He covers my body with his and kisses me so hungrily that it curls my toes and makes me wrap my legs around his waist so that I can feel the hard length of him against my center. He grinds into me ... a brutal assault of dry humping that rivals the real thing. He continues to do that and to kiss me until he's crazy with it, then he pushes himself to his knees and pulls his shirt off.

He is a beautiful man. So beautiful in fact that I sit up to get a better look at as much of his chest as he'll let me before ripping my shirt off. It's not much. He tears it up and over my head ... scrub shirt, undershirt, and bra and I hear it rustle against the ground and settle. I'm reminded of cotton sheets and feminine skin against mine.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I gather the bedspread in my fists and arch my back as he sucks my nipple into his mouth. It's more to keep myself grounded and firmly here with him and not really about how good he feels. I have to force myself to think of what he's doing to me. I shouldn't have to ... but I do. He moves to my neck, my ear, my forehead, peppering me with tenderness. It's slow now ... and he explores my upper torso like he's never tasted it before. When he nips my ribs. I laugh and smack his arm. He lowers the front of my pants just enough to find my belly button and licks it in response. His fingers move over the scar from my surgery and I freeze.

That belongs to her.

She put it there and she should be the one to touch it.

When he slides his mouth against it ... I stiffen and push at his shoulders. "Don't."

"You're beautiful," he assures me, still trailing his fingers over the reddish brown line. "Don't be self conscious. It doesn't suit you."

His mouth goes back to the scar and I remember the crown of her head as she kneeled before me in my bedroom and used her tongue to erase all my scars from memory. It's the crown of his head that I see now and it's his tongue undulating against the brand she gave me and I push at him again, trying to slide away from him. "I said don't! Mark, stop!"

He looks shocked when I wriggle from under him and stand up. "What's wrong with you?"

I wrench my shirt over my head ... and I'm shaking. I hear him shift and his feet hit the floor, then his arms are around me and they feel like a vise. "Mark-"

"It's normal to feel different after you've gone under the knife. I see it all the time, but you're not different and you're still so pretty that you're killing me."

"Just ... give me some damn breathing room!" I twist uncomfortably.

He keeps clinging. "If it bothers you this much ... I can make the scar disappear. I can go in and -"

"I don't have body issues! And you're not touching it again!" I pull out of his arms and run my hands through my hair, sucking in lungfuls of air. "I have to go."

"No, you don't." He moves in front of the door, blocking it. He holds his hands up like he's surrendering ... like his surrender can make me surrender. "Callie, just -"

"Get out of my way!"

"If you don't have body issues then what is your god damn problem?!"

"I don't have a problem." My teeth are gritted but the lie crawls through easily. It slithers from me like a snake that has been coiled in me too long. "Move out of the way."

"I can't live like a fucking monk, Callie! I can't! It has been so long since I had sex that I forgot when and that was fine because I was waiting for you ... but I can't keep waiting! So - so suck it up because you're about to get on my last nerve and I can't take it another damn minute!"

My bottom jaw drops open and my blood pressure goes up ... I can actually hear the blood rushing through my veins. "Suck it up!? SUCK IT UP!?"

"Yeah! Suck it up! Snap out of it!"

"Oooooh! I hate you!"

"Well, I don't like you a whole hell of a lot either!"

"GET OUT OF MY WAY!"

He closes his eyes. "Wait ... I didn't - just talk to me and -"

"We're finished talking!" I yell. "Now move out of my fucking way before I kick your ass."

I mean the threat. I will hit him if he doesn't move. He wrenches the door open and gestures for me to leave. I mutter a terse, "Fuck you."

And he responds with, "Go to HELL!"

"I'm already there."

I was most assuredly not in Hell just yet, but it was coming.

I whip out my cell phone and call a cab, then wait in front of the hospital for it to arrive. I give the driver Erica's address and sit gazing at the city from the backseat. I can see her everywhere. I see her at the corner of Main and Poplar where we waited for the crossing light and got drenched by a car that hit a mud puddle. I can see her on Benson street after I talked her into a pair of shoes that hurt her feet. She hated them, but she wore them because she knew I liked them. I can see her at McDonald's after I said that I needed a Big Mac and she ate half of it so I wouldn't feel guilty about the calories. I see her everywhere I look and when I drive past the building where I share an apartment with Mark ... I see her, and not him, waiting there for me.

I've made a decision. I've taken a step. I'm going to be with her and I don't care what anyone says ... even God. I'll risk Hell for an eternity for whatever time I have here on earth as long as we don't waste another second. I tell the driver to leave when he drops me off at the mailbox. I hurry. I do a happy skip, hop, jog thing down her winding driveway and practically bounce up the steps like a kid on Halloween. I didn't bring her anything to give her except myself and that will be enough. I know it will.

She answers the door after I ring the bell for the third time. She's wearing a cream colored robe and its satin, but she looks softer than the fabric. I feel like I'm seeing her for the first time and I'm falling in love in that moment all over again. I see her brow crease in obvious confusion and I open the storm door before she can. I touch her hair, her cheek. "I need to talk to you."

Her eyes are very, very wide. "Uh ... I have a phone."

I try to pout in that girly cute way that I probably can't pull off but I feel girly. For the first time in my life ... I'm doing what makes ME happy. I'm doing what I was made for. "It's not a phone call kind of talk."

When I touch the tie on her robe and playfully tug ... she sniffs the air. "Are - Callie, are you drunk?"

"Nope." I smile so big it hurts. "Invite me in, Yellow."

When she glances into her living room nervously ... my smile fades and I know. I just ... know. When I hear a woman's voice sleepily ask, "Baby? Who is it?" ... I take a step back as if I've been sucker punched.

"Just a second," Erica calls. She steps out onto the porch and bites her bottom lip. "Callie-"

My voice sounds like a four year olds when I finally find it. "Sh - she calls you 'baby'?"

Erica ignores my question. "Why are you here?"

I stare at the door of her house and I want to rush through it to see who's replacing me. I want to rip out her hair, her eyes, her everything.

Erica clears her throat. "You can't be mad. You can't. You're across town living the cliché with Sloan and I'm not gonna be lonely for you. I'm not going to sit here night after night thinking of what you're doing with him ... so you can't be mad."

"Is she pretty?"

"Don't."

It's the same thing I said to Mark earlier and I wonder if I'm suffocating her like he suffocated me. I hope so. We stare at each other for at least thirty seconds. I finally turn and walk down the stairs. She comes after me and catches me in the driveway. She grabs my arm and I pull hard, trying to yank away. She holds firm and I can't shake her. I'll never shake her. God ... I don't want to be me.

"Callie, please!"

"Please what?!" I yell. "What am I supposed to say!?"

"Tell me why you're here."

"Does it matter!?"

"You matter! Everything you do matters to me, Callie!"

"How much did I matter fifteen minutes ago?"

The porch light comes on behind her before she can reply and I see a flash of brown hair as the door creaks open. I'm too far away to see her face, but she's nothing like me. She's petite, young, and so thin she practically vanishes into the crack of the door. She gazes toward us and while I can't make out her features ... I know she's pretty. She's pretty enough to have everything I'll ever want and that makes her beautiful. I can't take it. I can't breathe. I can't think beyond the here and now and wonder how I'll live at all without a heart. "I'll see you later."

"She's convenient. That's all, Cal. She's convenient."

I walk away ... then I run.

Erica doesn't follow me.

But she's still haunting me.

The O'Malley house is three doors down and it's darkened. I knock anyway and when Louise peers out the window with wide eyes and sees me ... I can hear her fingernails scramble against the door as she unlocks it. She pulls me in and hugs me ... whether its because she misses me or because the damn breaks at that precise moment doesn't matter. She plies me with tea and cookies and wakes up Jerry to drive me home. He tries to make me pick a car on the drive but I tell him not right now. He offers to drown George if I want him to, but I don't reply.

When I walk into the apartment building ... the doorman greets me and escorts me to the elevator. I trudge down the hall ... unlock the door and look at Mark. He gets to his feet slowly, like the threat of going another round with me makes it hard to rise. I stare at him. He glares at me. I'm still dressed in my scrubs and I pull off both my shirts ... just the way he did. My bra is still at the hospital.

He watches me shimmy out of my pants and kick them aside. When I take a step toward him ... he sets the beer bottle he's holding down and stands upright just in time to catch me.

We don't apologize to each other right then.

Our bodies say it loud and clear.

He brushes everything off the coffee table and eases me down onto it. It's frigid against my back, but I don't care. I don't show it. He wastes no time burying his face between my legs and I come very close to yanking him bald as he gives me multiple orgasms. Then ... I suck him off, kneeling between his legs and he doesn't pull my hair, but he doesn't let it go either. It's the first time I've let him go all the way there ... it's my way of telling him I trust him and I swallow everything he gives me.

We go through four of the twelve condoms in his dresser drawer and I come more than I ever knew I could. When he carries me to bed still buried inside me with my legs around his waist, he says, "I didn't mean anything I said earlier."

"Me either."

He eases me against the bed and looks down at me. "I love you."

I give in. I give up. He's earned the right to hear it and I've made him wait long enough. "I love you, too."

Two more condoms vanish from the box and he fucks me hard enough to clear my head. He fucks me hard enough that when I go to sleep ... I don't dream. He fucks me hard enough ... that I tell myself I meant the words and that he can love enough for the both of us if I didn't.

I tell myself that I'm over her now and hope that she's happy with the brown haired harpy who says "baby" like she has a forked tongue. Fuck both of them ... I tell myself. Be happy with Mark!

But the funny thing about telling ... is that it's not showing ... and you can only talk for so long.


	6. Chapter 6

There's something that changes inside you when the balloon that you tied around your wrist to carry your dreams in floats away. I felt it loosen last night at Erica's house, when that woman stepped on the porch and was no longer just a voice, and then it slipped off and floated out of my reach when Mark jarred me enough with sex to make it come undone. I gave him all of me. It wasn't as raunchy as it has been before, but what it lacked in raunch was more than made up for with positions and eagerness. It wasn't mechanical for me. I was in it all the way and I begged him for more. I spoke his name like a chant and played guitar strings on his back with my fingernails. I wrapped my legs around him and let him slide into my body and straight into my heart. In a way ... it felt like closing a door and opening another one.

A closet door.

Closed.

A living room door.

Opened.

This is the life I am choosing as opposed to the life that chose me.

I want this. I want the normal, vanilla, non-controversial joy of introducing my boyfriend. I want the domesticity, the photos of us in frames, our clothes touching in the closet and him mapping me enough that he knows my every weakness. I want petty arguments and his dirty socks under my feet and I want this. I do. He has never really hurt me. Not really. I let him think he did so that I wouldn't hurt him and maybe he's pushy at times and he can bring blood with the crack of his tongue when he's pissed of ... but he's never really, truly pulled the rug from under me the way that other people have. I can do this. I can settle into this routine and I can be happy and I can keep him happy and I won't have to ever say anything to him about Erica. Ever.

I wake up with him kissing my stomach and I flip him onto his back and kiss his. I climb on top of him and I don't think about scars or her or balloons or dreams. I think about him and how he fills me. By the time we leave for work ... we're out of condoms and I can barely close my legs without flinching. You know ... I didn't feel anything like pain the morning after Erica and I had sex. I just felt ... sated, but as I walk into the hospital next to Mark ... I'm sore. And when he kisses me so intensely that someone whoops at the end of the hallway ... the word 'convenient' flashes through my mind. That's what Erica said last night about her slut and when Mark smiles at me and I see his heart on his sleeve ... I wonder if that's what I've reduced him to. Is he just convenient? Do I really love him?

Do I want to?

When he tells me to have a good day and turns my collar down with a wink ... I decide that I do love him. It's not the tumbling, falling, freezing, heated, and bittersweet fucking MESS that I have with Erica, but it's there. See, I didn't set out to tame Seattle Grace's manwhore. I thought about it the day I smiled at the nurses in challenge, but it was a thought ... not something I could do. Not me. I'm that girl in school that he would have stuffed in lockers. I'm the girl who had frizzy hair that would have begged for his spitballs and big, thick glasses that he probably would have snatched and hidden. And he's that guy that every girl like me sat in English class watching because he was so unattainable and flawless that we secretly scrawled his name in our notebook with a heart around it. I didn't waltz out of Joe's with him in the hopes of something like commitment, but that's where we're at. We're living together and fighting over the remote and bitching about leaving toilet seats up and who's using all the hot water. We're playful and our banter is sometimes so funny that we just stop talking and laugh at each other. He can make my sides ache with his goofy outlook on life and I can make him howl with laughter when he hears my cynical one. And we are good in bed. Make no mistake about that. We are GOOD IN BED.

What I should be doing ... is thanking my lucky stars that he saw me crawling after Miami and showed me how to stand up again. What I should be doing is showering him with love and devotion the same way he showered me with cold water and forced me to wake up. Everything is all about what I should be doing and I know that I should be doing it ... but I can't. What I am doing ... is wondering why he chose me and whether I want to be chosen.

I watch him walk around the corner. He's typing something on his Blackberry and I smile when mine vibrates.

'It's a little late for Sunrise Waffles, but I'm asking you for tomorrow. You in?'

I chuckle and text back, 'Depends. You plan on letting me get any sleep because we're both off and I don't want to see sunrise anything.'

'Cancel waffles. How about a full body massage?'

'How about sleep?'

'You need it. You talked in your sleep all night. Is that a girl thing? I don't talk about Derek. Do I?'

OH SHIT!

I nearly drop the phone out of my hands and do a weird hand flapping dance to get it back under control. I do drop my purse and scramble to grab everything. I feel all eyes on me and I look back down the hall where he vanished. He's peering around the corner at me and when he catches me looking he pretends that he's engrossed in the fire alarm. He pretends that he didn't see me flake out. His face is actually a little red and I wonder what he's thinking about dating a klutz. I try to laugh it off and have eye sex with him.

He doesn't really help me out with that. He just ... looks at me.

I'm pretty good at guessing what his looks mean, but this one is not one I've seen before. It's ... uncomfortable.

"Callie?"

My smile fades and I feel a hot poker race up my spine. I lift my head a little higher and I know that she's standing right behind me. If I ever find a field of lilac bushes ... I will rent a bulldozer and not stop until its all mulch. Fuck lilac. I can feel her just a few inches behind me and I swear that her fingers brush against the back of my shirt. Those fingers touched someone else. That's what I'm thinking and I don't have a right to think it at all because my everything touched someone else, but I can't let it go. God, rage explodes in me. It's like pure, undiluted furor and I turn my head just a little to let her know that I heard her before I walk away.

Fuck lilacs.

And fuck her.

"Callie!" she says it louder now, and I can hear the passion there, but I keep right on walking.

This is me ... moving forward and not looking back like my mother said.

"You okay?" Mark meets me halfway, obviously seeing the anger on my face.

"I changed my mind about waffles. Think the cafeteria has any?"

I see him look down the hallway again and I know he's looking at Erica. "What's going on?"

I shrug. "They don't call her Atila the Hahn for nothing. She's a bitch. She pissed me off."

"Since when does Erica Hahn cry?"

That stops me. My sneakers squeak on the floor as I draw up short. I have to do it. I have to look at her. As soon as I do ... I wish that I hadn't. She's standing there with her hair pulled back and her rumpled clothes looking like a hot mess ... and she is definitely crying. She's also staring at me like I am her entire reason for being alive and her lips part as she mouths the word 'please'. It's the same silent way she said she loved me and it almost doubles me over.

Mark is still gazing at her when I grab his sleeve and pull him into the cafeteria.

I don't eat.

Neither does he.

We both push our food around on our plates and he keeps clearing his throat like his big, huge heart has moved from his sleeve to rest there.

I don't watch him choke on it.

I look away.

Mark doesn't kiss me after breakfast. It's the perfect chance to do the male posturing thing and strut from the cafeteria with a swagger that screams 'I got laid more than you last night', but he doesn't. He puts his hands in his pockets and tells me he's running late and needs to get his scrubs on. As tempted as I am to ask if he needs some help ... I don't. If there had never been an Erica and there had never been a Miami and I had never felt her touch ... I would ask. Not only would I ask ... I'd be the woman he deserves. All my life ... I wanted someone to love me enough that they told me every day, that they showed me without even saying it, and they wanted me. Mark is all I could ask for and I feel like I've tainted us by smearing him with the broken watercolors that I've been bleeding.

I owe him the truth.

I need to tell him why I hold back a lot more than I should and that me not giving all of myself is not about trusting him ... it's about him trusting me.

He shouldn't.

I don't.

And I don't really have superpowers.

But like any good super hero, I hide behind a false identity and creep around a lot in the dark. Literally and figuratively. I pass most of the morning lurking in the basement where I used to live. Some of the lights are out and there are corners so black that anyone could be there and I wouldn't see them. I surf the net on my phone, I try to nap on a pile of body bags but that's too Emo even for me and I'm in Emo hell, and then I pace. When I lived here ... I didn't fear the corners. I'd curl under the cover and fall asleep the second my head hit the pillow and I'd bounce back up and be the first doctor on the scene when a page came through. I went through the motions of life and when I lived in this basement ... I hated it. I felt sorry for myself but it was for very different reasons. I hated being alone here and now I've come here to BE alone.

I finally sit down where my bed used to be and lean my head against the wall. Right now? I miss this place. If I could step back in time and not get caught living here ... I'd still be here. I'd still be that recluse in the dungeon who hid away like a dirty, anti-social secret. I'd still be the first doctor on the scene and eat, sleep, and breathe medicine instead of this foul air I've been exhaling. I wouldn't give a crap what people thought about me or worry about whether I had any friends because I had video games and seclusion and that was okay. I'd be happy. I'd still be.

Where did I go? Am I even here anymore?

When I was six years old ... I had a Supergirl costume and when my mother forced me to go with her to the grocery store one day ... I wore it under my clothes. I crept away from her while she was engrossed in the produce aisle and ran outside to the phone booth, where I ripped my dress off to expose the S on my leotard. I came roaring out of that phone booth with my arms held out in front of me like I was going to take off any second and ... I didn't. It hurt my feelings so I climbed on top of a dumpster behind the grocery store to see if getting a little air under my cape could help me, but all I wound up getting was stitches in my head, a busted knee, and a rude awakening courtesy of my father's spanking hand. That hurt my feelings a little worse than anything else, but he only left me crying in my room for ten minutes before he came back and cried with me.

I learned as a kid that you can't fly ... I learned as an adult that you can ... I flew with Erica. I'm not talking about in an airplane. I'm talking about flying off the dumpster of my life and soaring into the air until I was windblown, exhilarated, and strong enough to lift the world in my hands and give it to her. If she had asked me to ... I could have bottled the ocean ... as long as it meant that I could dangle from her lips a little longer. I handled our morning after all wrong. Instead of running away and doubting what she made me feel ... I should have woken up in her arms because that was my only chance. My mother woke us up the second time so I don't know what it would have been like to watch her wake up and smile at me.

Maybe it's better to not know.

I sit against the wall until my tailbone protests and then I pace some more.

I get another text message.

It's her.

'Where are you?'

I don't answer.

And when I hear my name on the intercom system ... I know it's at HER request so I ignore it.

What I can't ignore is a 911 page to the ER and I can't ignore the man who fell off a ladder and broke his leg.

What I CAN do ... is not see George in him when he starts to scream in pain.

I see a brown haired woman with a pale blue robe and I make her scream again.

"You have to stop avoiding me."

I don't reply.

"Come on, Callie! I didn't do anything wrong and you know that. You know that!"

My iPod buds are in my ears, but the music isn't loud enough to drown Erica out. I turn the page of the magazine in front of me. Despite the fact that she once assured me she kept her private life private ... she acts like an angry girlfriend when she snatches up the magazine and lightly pops me over the head with it. It's not hard, but it is enough to make my ear pieces fall out and piss me off. I see Cristina's mouth drop open across the cafeteria and I count to ten. Where the hell is Mark?

"Just ... talk to me. Give me ten minutes."

"Go. Away."

"No." She taps the magazine against her palm like it's a billybat and she's an officer on duty. "If I have to smack some reason into you ... I will."

I angrily shove my iPod into my pocket and get to my feet. "Hit me with that one more time, Hahn, and I'm shoving it up your ass."

She does it.

So help me God she actually whacks me on the head like I'm a puppy who just pissed in her shoe.

So help me God I actually think it's cute and I want to smile at her, but I can't. I don't.

I can only take so much self loathing in my life. Seriously. Just let me hate her, Lord, if it's so wrong ... just let me hate her.

I glare at her. I don't speak to her. I leave her holding my magazine and head for the door, but she follows me. Gripping my arm, she pulls me around near Cristina's table and I brace myself for her to hit me again, but she doesn't. She waits for me to look at her and when I do, she's not smiling either. "Talk to me," she says. "Just ... say something."

"I said what I had to say last night."

"You didn't say anything last night, but you wanted to. Tell me now."

"No, thanks."

"Damn it, Torres!" She rakes her hand through her hair and I think she's forgotten that it's pulled back because she makes little horns stands out everywhere. It matches the slightly demented look on her face and before I can say anything to insult her ... she starts to cry again. It's not loud. It's like Jasper ... silent pain that falls like buckets down her flushed cheeks and it speaks volumes about what she's dying to say. And we're in the middle of a crowd so she can't voice it. Jasper is in the middle of a vast nothing ... so he doesn't bother.

I could tell her what I wanted to say. She could tell me that the other woman was convenient again and I could let it matter enough to forgive her. I could break up with Mark. She could break her rule about on call room sex and I could dive off the dumpster with her and fly so high that gravity is just a word and not a reality. But I can't. The difference between can't and can is sometimes all the effort it takes to change the world and we still don't do it. If I change my world now ... when I'm starting to settle into it ... I may never fit anywhere again.

"Tell me!"

She's hoping. She knows why I was there, but she wants confirmation because that means that she's not clinging to the promise of nothing.

I glance down at her neck. What I want to see is her pulse. I rested my lips against that pulse once to prove that she was real.

And there's a hickey there now. Small, possibly accidental, possibly she doesn't even know it exists. Possibly.

I suddenly don't think she's cute anymore. I think she's hideous and I think that her eyes are too big and her mouth is too small and her hair pulled back makes her ears look big and possibly deformed.

I can feel my own face flush with color and that rush of blood to my head makes me cut her deep. "Perhaps you'd like to take a shower and look professional before you get to work tomorrow." I look her over from head to toe. "Because you stink. Like the convenient whore you slept with."

My magazine flies from her hand and hits me in the chest and when she walks past me ... she shoulder checks me hard enough to nearly knock me down. I feel like a house of cards that finally caved in on itself. It's almost a relief.

I turn to watch her walk away and see Mark standing right behind me. When he motions for me to follow him ... I already feel what's coming. If the anvils about my identity crisis haven't knocked him down with the truth yet ... I'll have to. He stalks. I trudge. He nods at several co-workers. I don't make eye contact. He looks mad as hell. I feel mad as hell.

He knows.

He goes into the same on call room that he tried to seduce me in yesterday. Was it really only yesterday that I had the bravery to go to her ... and then the bravery to go to him? That feels like a lifetime ago. He sits down on the bed, then slides back and pulls his legs up, where he props his elbows on his knees. I stand at the door with one hand on the knob as if I can flee from whatever he wants to say to me just like I've been fleeing from everything else in my life. He rests one hand on his chin and I know that I've kept distance between us ... I know that I have kept one foot of truth between us ... but right now it feels like a vast desert and he's dying for water. He's dying for me to give him something and I want to close that distance more than I ever have.

I'm a coward who simply says, "What is it?"

The seconds tick past on the big, ugly, school room clock on the wall. I hear them. I hear his breathing and taste my anger and fear. I stare at him so long that the edges around him blur and I'm the one in the desert and he's the one that may have been a mirage all along. When he speaks ... the room has been silent for so long that I jump ... even though his voice is soft. "What happened in Miami? What really happened in Miami?"

The irony of it is ... I've been him.

In the Archfield, I waited on the bed for George to come home and for him to tell me what I already knew. I waited for him to confirm that the lingering glances between him and Stevens were not in my head and that I wasn't being gas lighted by my own paranoia and insecurity. I waited for him to confirm it ... but he didn't have to. I thought that George blurted it too easily that night. I thought that the admission came from his lips like a warrior cry, but now I know better. Now I know that his heart was pounding and he was terrified of the words and of my reaction and of me. Because I'm terrified to say it, but I dig deep because I owe him that much. I owe him the world. "I slept with Erica."

The hand on his chin doesn't move and I've only thought that I was swallowed by the quiet before. Now ... I'm buried in it and it's a quicksand that pulls me under.

I was silent, too. When George confessed. I sat through an entire night with my back begging me to lie down and I didn't say anything except 'I forgive you'. If Mark says that to me ... I'll know he doesn't mean it.

It's unforgivable.

But in my defense ... "We were broken up at the time, Mark."

"Is this what you do?" he asks quietly. "You break up with someone, sleep with someone else immediately, and then go back to the person you broke up with? Because I'm seeing a pattern."

"What do you -"

"You broke up with O'Malley and picked me up the first night I met you. You spent the next morning telling me that you didn't have a boyfriend. Then ... you married him." He's still so deadly damn still that it's unnerving. "Then you broke up with me, slept with her ... god ... her..., and then you came back to me and I was thisclose to proposing. So ... there's a pattern. See it yet?"

"I'm sorry."

"Which part are you sorry for? Hmm? Don't answer that." He lowers his hand and I can see the steely iron of his jaw. "Fuck off."

"Mark-"

"Don't say my name. Don't ever say my name because it sounds like nails on a chalkboard coming from you. All this time ... since Miami ... I've been walking the straight and narrow for you ... and ...hell... you're not even fucking straight!"

"Don't -"

"Get out."

"But -"

"Get the fuck out and go back to my apartment and get your shit and leave."

I start to open the door and I can barely see because my eyes are swimming enough to drown.

"Wait."

I look back at him, but I can't make him out in the sea of colors. I can tell that he hasn't moved.

"I did sleep with that nurse and her one breast was better than anything you have."

You know what the truly and fantastically pathetic thing is ... I didn't believe him when he said he didn't cheat. And now I don't believe him when he said he did.

I don't believe much of anything except that the Archfield is going to be seeing me that night.

And that's exactly what happens.

I pack my clothes into garbage bags and leave them in my car when I get the hotel room. The bellhops know me by name and they offer to carry my 'luggage'. I tell them no.

The Archfield doesn't need a reminder that trash is in their midst.

I tell Webber I have the flu. I drain the wet bar in my room and the second the maid restocks it ... I drain it again.

Thinking with a drunken brain is just as hard as thinking with a clear one. You don't find answers in the bottom of a bottle, no matter how much you nurse at it like it can show you the world. The third day of my self imposed exile finds me answering the door to Cristina and I haven't slept any of the hours I've been here. I was expecting another bottle of rum from the bar, but she's standing there holding nothing and I let her in because for Cristina Yang to visit anyone in their time of crisis is akin to the Virgin Mary appearing in Playboy. What? I'm hung over. Analogies only make sense when you're not hung over.

She pushes empty bottles off the chair and sits down at the table. There are no food wrappers there, just enough empty alcohol to make her shake her head. "What are you doing?"

"I'm on a slow boat to China. What are you doing?"

Putting her elbows on the table, she sighs. "I've been calling you."

"Phone's off."

"Are you okay?"

"What do you think?"

"Mark is telling everyone that you broke up with him because he cheated on you and he's saying he cheated on you because you're a psychotic bitch. He's acting like he's not sorry. Is that really what happened?"

"No."

"Did Erica happen?"

I nod. I can't ask about her because I can't possibly sink any lower and just the thought of her has my stomach aching from crawling around on it. Through glass.

Cristina doesn't look shocked. She doesn't look anything except vague which is what she always does when she rolls newfound knowledge around her head like a ball. I give her time to process it. Hell, we could be here a while because I can't even process it. She finally scratches her cheek and says, "What are you going to do about it? Because this," she gestures around the room. "isn't working."

I feel it not working. I know that it's not working. She doesn't have to state the obvious. "How did you find me?"

"Uh ... I called the front desk and asked for your room number."

"Oh ... right."

"Actually ... Erica called the front desk. Then told me where you were. And here I am."

"Let me guess ... she said that you could scrub in if you come check on me? Or possibly come and poison me?"

"No. I came because I saw your little downward spiral last time so get your shit together, check out, and come back to my place. I know the couch isn't much but it beats being alone and I have better cable channels."

"I have porn."

"I have a porn DVDs."

"You win."

I didn't bring any clothes in. I'm still in my scrubs from two days ago. She insists on driving. I don't know if she took a cab here or if she was dropped off or if she walked the six miles from the hospital. Either way ... she drives and I think it's less about the alcohol I consumed and more about the fact that she knows I'm too scattered to work a steering wheel. Not that I'd drink and drive ... hell, who am I kidding. Every time I've driven anywhere for months I've been drunk on lies.

I need to learn to be the passenger and not the driver because I misplaced the road map of my life. I had what I thought I wanted with Mark and then pissed it into the wind. I had what I thought I wanted with Erica and fear it too much to detour onto her street. I need a new driver right now. I'll be Miss Daisy.

We only take two of my several bags into her apartment. It's not because I think that Mark will come take me back home or Erica will sweep me to her place. It's because I don't have the will to do anything except sit on the couch. I still don't shower. I still don't comb my hair or brush my teeth and Cristina doesn't tell me I should. Hell, there's enough penicillin growing in the pizza box on the coffee table to mask any smell from me and her laundry is all over the place. It's almost gratifying to be filthy. I've wallowed in the mud for a while now ... I should look like it.

I don't start to cry until Cristina sits next to me. Her leg brushes mine and I remember that I have ill fitting skin and bruises on the inside and scars on the outside. Just that simple second of accidental contact breaks the well open and I let it wash over me. Reality can be a bitch.

I've turned Mark into a liar who would rather claim to be a cheater than a man who shared with a woman. He'd rather have people look at him with scorn and label him a manwhore, even though he worked his ass off to shake the label, than admit that I cheated on him with Erica. His pride is bruised. If I had cheated with a man ... at least he'd know how to compete. But he can't.

I've turned Erica into someone who begs and cries. I punished her for doing the exact same thing I did with Mark. I pushed her away, loved her a little but not enough and then held it against her for following my lead. I gave her hope and dashed it. I let her in and pushed her out. And her pride is bruised, too. I chose him over her. I chose to be his and then expected her to stay mine. But she can't.

And I can't keep up with myself because I'm not just lost ... I'm turned around, upside down, inside out, and bleeding tears.

Cristina lets me lean on her shoulder. She doesn't hug me. That's off limits with Yang. She doesn't do affection and she stays as detached as she possibly can.

But when she doesn't complain about me soaking her shirt ... I know that she was holding me as tight as she could.

I breathe and stop resenting that I have to.

The nurses have a field day with me. On my first day back at work ... one of them puts a piece of printer paper in my locker that looks like an ad, but it's not. It's something they came up with and it says that when you keep getting cheated on ... the problem is yours and not your partners. There's an eight hundred number. 1-800-You-Suck. I crumple it and drop it into the trash on my way out. They all look my way to see if I will react and I walk past them. Someone says 'Loser' in that valley girl, Paris Hilton wannabe, stuck up and stupid kind of way that makes my skin crawl.

I'm fifteen. I'm fifteen and there are spitballs flying and gum in my hair and the teacher is looking at me like she wishes she could help, but she was THAT girl, too, and they all like her now.

I enjoy breathing into a bag in the linen closet while I contemplate how important my career is to me because I know how to break bones and I can rage through the nurses lounge like a wild fire. I extinguish that spark before it explodes by scrubbing in on a surgery with Bailey. I'm there because it's a decent place to hide and not because I can really help that much. I do what any first year intern could do and then I sit in the bathroom stall until my shift ends. I know that Mark is there because I heard him being paged, but I don't see him. And Erica spends the day doing a heart transplant so I don't see her either.

What I do see ... is a bottle of sleeping pills that night. They were prescribed to Preston Burke by Derek Shepherd. They're on top of the refrigerator and the date is just two weeks after Denny Duquette died. Burke had been shot and I doubt that made for much rest, and the pills aren't expired. So ... I take one and sleep that night so deeply and so sufficiently that I feel like playing music the next day in the OR. I scrub in with a dancing 'Let's Rock' and my scrub nurse murmurs 'Let's Roll' and I crank up the sound, remember why I'm there, and try to do my job.

I don't do it very well.

The patient codes at the halfway point and it's because I clipped an artery, couldn't stop the bleeding, and then couldn't call it either because I was too shocked that I had actually done something that ridiculous. Webber has to go with me to tell the family that little Johnny won't just not play football again ... he won't come home again. There are threats that fall just shy of my head on a stake and the promise of a multi-million dollar lawsuit that could be a knee jerk thing, but it sounds convincing as all hell. The family demands answers that I can't provide and Webber gently reminds them that Seattle Grace is a teaching hospital like that even fucking matters. That's a slap in their face.

Erica taught ME and I still bled her dry, too.

It's hospital policy after such an error to submit to a drug screen.

I can't prove that Ambien was prescribed to me.

Yeah ... getting suspended for two weeks pending investigation is like the icing on my fucking cake. No joy.

I sit on Cristina's sofa again and wait for the walls to close in or just stop playing with me and implode. I wait for something and get nothing. I watch day turn to night twice and then my cell phone rings. It's Jasper. I can hear my mother coaxing him and listen to him prattle about his dolphin 'burfday' cake. Go Shawty. He tells me he is having a horse at his party and teacups and Superman. He tells me that he will swim with dolphins (daw-funs) and play and dance and can I please come because he misses me. Then my mom is on the phone and she's telling me that it's the following weekend and I tell her I'll be there soon.

I need home.

I may not like it there and I may resent the money ... but it's way more familiar than this prison cell.

I pack that night and call the airport, then I drive there and park in the exact same spot that Erica parked us in when we left for Miami. I sit there for twenty minute before I can stop crying and actually get my luggage and go in. When you push people too far ... you can't pull them back and as I sit in that parking deck and listen to the cars go in and out and feel the vibrations of planes coming and going ... I know what it is to be completely and utterly alone. All those people ... they have someplace to be. They're either going to someone or coming back from from someone and I hate them all for it. I pushed. I never pulled.

I finally crawl out of the car and put on my trusty dark glasses while I go to baggage claim and stand in line. We're all sheep. All of us. We do what we're told and we follow rules and we walk orderly (don't run) and if we're lucky ... we don't regret it. I regret following rules. I don't think I believe in God's rules anymore and I mankind's rules can kiss my ass. I hand my suitcase to the woman behind the counter and tap down on the impulse to scream 'fire' into the crowd and watch them all run ... like sheep ... then head toward my terminal. I buy a book that I won't read and sit in a chair against the wall and wait.

"Callie."

My eyes are closed when I hear him and I don't really believe that he's there at all until he touches my knee.

Mark Sloan is at the airport, too, and I raise my head when I that he's in the chair next to me. I fight the urge to ask him if I'm having a dream.

"Cristina told me you were leaving. Is your dad okay?"

"It's Jasper's birthday," I reply like I haven't taken a knife to both of our throats and have a right to speak at all. "Going home."

"Are you okay?"

"Are you?"

He shakes his head. "Not really. No."

"Me either. Not really."

"Are you coming back?"

The thought of not coming back has crossed my mind a lot. Not just NOT coming back from Miami ... but not coming back at all. As in ... not waking up. Shut up. You'd have a death wish too if you had to walk barefoot on razor blades that you put down. He notices that I don't answer and I see the muscles in his neck move when he swallows. I still don't say anything. Apparently I still can't be honest with him and say that I want to die and can he maybe put me in the shower again until I want to live. Because he will. He's here again and that's something.

There's a movement to the left and I look that way. Erica standing a few feet away. ERICA HAHN IS STANDING A FEW FEET AWAY. Now I KNOW that I'm having a dream and it's really a nightmare and the rabbit from Donnie Darko will probably show up, too. Mark follows my gaze and swears under his breath. "Is she going with you?"

"No."

Erica does that neck roll thing that tells me she's as tense as I am and then she walks up to us like she's not the River of Denial that I couldn't swim across to get to him. "Sloan," she says by way of greeting.

"Cunt," he replies.

I put my head in my hands.

Can I please just wake up?

She ignores him and says, "Callie, I'm sorry about what happened with your patient. I - I told Richard that I gave you Ambien samples so if he asks you -"

"Don't lie for her," Mark snaps. "Just because you're a fucking dy-"

"I swear to God, Sloan," she growls. "I will make you a eunuch if you say what I think you're going to say."

"What ... you don't know you're gay?" Mark challenges.

"What ... you don't know you're a dickhead?" chirps Erica sweetly. She looks at me and says, "Is he going with you?"

"No."

"What are you doing here?" They both ask each other at once. What follows is a litany of 'fuck you, it's none of your business' and 'kiss my ass' and 'get the fuck out of her' and 'you need to die' and 'fuck off before you die' and an assortment of threats, taunts, and pre-school posturing.

"I'm not doing this." I push myself to my feet and pick up my purse.

Mark stands up beside me and here we are. We're not the sweet trinity that Jasper, Erica, and I made on the beach. We're an unholy trinity and none of us really want to be here because the air is freezing and the stench is clinging and it's different degrees of personal hell for each of us. It doesn't really matter to me that they came. It doesn't really matter to me that the second I walk away he could strangle her or she could castrate him or ... they could go to the airport hotel and fuck each other until I'm just a footnote in history. The drama of it, the angst of it, the grand gesture of swallowing their bruised pride and being here just because I may not be here again doesn't affect me.

You remember how I mentioned that there were two roads before me? I told you that one is dangerous to the point of risking my heart again and one is safe because that person looks at me and I know they would never, ever hurt me.

I bet you thought Mark was the dangerous one and Erica was a safe one.

Well, guess what?

The dangerous one is the one that I've been on since the beginning -- where three cars weave in and out of each other and clip bumpers until we keep spinning out and hitting walls. We're three cars with no headlights, no destination, radios that play cheesy love songs and windows that don't roll down to let in fresh air. We speed too fast, we go too slow, we tailgate and angrily blare the horn, but we don't get anywhere. It's a circle. A vicious, ugly, and pothole filled circle that we can't get off of.

The safe one? That's my baby brother and he's in Miami waiting for me to come celebrate another year of his life and I know that if I let him hold my heart for just a minute ... he will clumsily repair it.

So, I pick the safe one.

I pick Jasper.

I walk right between Mark and Erica and my shoulders brush each of them.

I smell her lilacs and his Armani.

I feel them both looking down at me because they both have inches on me.

I hear them both say my name.

And I see one road ... one path ... one light at the end of the tunnel.

I'm going home.

The story really starts now.


	7. Chapter 7

I don't read the book I bought on the flight. I don't watch the movie or pull out my iPod. What I do ... is listen to the old married couple in the same row of seats that I'm in bicker about their plans in Miami. She wants to sleep at the hotel and he wants to go straight to the beach. They're probably a hundred years old, but that hasn't doused his sense of adventure. He's ready to dive into the water and she points out that his pacemaker will probably stop working the second he does. I don't chime in with a medical perspective and they're so wrapped up in each other that they don't even notice that I'm there. My reflection in the window reminds me that I am, though. I watch States pass below me and I know that we're going hundreds of miles per hour, but I'd look you in the eye and tell you that my ghosts are flying faster. They're already ahead of me ... waiting in Miami for me just like the ocean waits for the old man and the bed waits for his wife.

I wonder who will win.

My medical opinion, if they had asked, is that you can sleep when you're dead and they should go stroll the beach.

Magic happens there.

The cab that I hail at the airport has no fucking air conditioning. It smells like a combination of feet and boiled cabbage and I quickly roll the window down when we pull away into the traffic. The driver doesn't appear to speak any English and I'm grateful that he stays silent except to say 'Where?'. If Jasper could be a cab driver ... that's how he would ask, too. It's a thirty minute drive to my parent's house. Home, I remind myself, not just theirs. I only fucked up home a little and now they're letting me come back. I don't know what it will be like to go into my old bedroom and I kinda hope that my mother was too scarred to wash my sheets. I bet I can still smell Erica's hair on my pillow.

I don't generally get all invested in music. I learn the words of overplayed songs and listen to it in surgery, but it's usually just background noise. As we merge in an out of traffic, though, every song on the radio is about me. Every song speaks to me and that's saying something because the only person that 'Ice Ice Baby' spoke to ... was Vanilla Ice. I'm 'too cold, too cold' and I develop a headache by the time that one ends. I listen to lyrics in clips and phrases as the cabbie corners on two wheels and lurches me left and right.

'My heart is crippled by the vein that I keep on closing ... you cut me open and I keep bleeding love.'

That's me and Erica. I was crippled when she came into my life and I closed off all the major veins to my heart ... but she knows hearts like the back of her white, skinny hand and she cut me open. I bleed and bleed and bleed for her.

'I'm not fine, I'm in pain. It's harder everyday. Maybe we're better off this way. It's better that we break.'

That's me and Mark. I wasn't fair to him and I'm making it all about me when he's the one that's hurting. Truth be told ... I'm almost relieved that it's over, that I can stop faking my way to his heart. He loved who I let him see. Not me. I was the lie that I thought he wanted and I wrapped him up in me until it suffocated him.

'I hope you know, I hope you know .. that this has nothing to do with you. It's personal ... myself and I ... we've got some straightening out to do ... and I'm gonna miss you like a child misses her blanket, but I've gotta get on with my life ...'

And that's just me. I miss them both. I miss them both in that disturbing, god awful, tranquilize you with fear kind of way that I felt when I accidentally lost Jasper in a crowd one time. I had taken my eyes off him for just a moment, but it was enough. I was fifteen. He was five. And I thought it was more important for me to duck out of sight so that the cool kids couldn't see that I was spending a Saturday night walking around the mall with my little brother for company. I hid behind a shrub and Jasper kept on going. I was so seized with panic when the jocks and their entourage passed and Jasper wasn't still holding my hand that I nearly fainted. I tripped over my own feet and bit my tongue when I called his name and it was only a span of seconds ... just a matter of looking left to right and not seeing his Teenage Mutant Ninja Shirt or his skateboard battered knees. It was the time it takes to breathe, taste fear, and then build up to scream ... and then he was there. I saw him through the window of the Disney Store and he was waiting for me to see him.

"I knew you'd find me," he had said, holding out his hand. "I got losted. Can we get some ice cream now?"

I bought him a triple scoop.

How sad that his five year old voice was so much more there than his twenty five year old voice.

He's sitting on the steps with a mannequin head and a wig when the cab pulls around the big circular drive and stops. The wig is blond and I'm sure that my mother painstakingly pinned it the head (maybe picturing headless Erica) so that he can brush it for hours and not scare himself by pulling it off. He slowly sets it aside and gets to his feet. His sneakers are on the wrong feet but they're velcroed tightly. His plaid shirt is tucked into his khaki shorts (which are pulled way too high) and he points to his head when I get out. "Look, Lee! New!"

Someone has given him a fresh buzz cut and he rubs it like a magic eight ball. I wonder if his fascination with hair stems from missing his own. I scratch his head while the driver retrieves my bag and then I narrow my eyes when the driver looks at Jazz a little too long. Jasper greets him with a 'hi, Mister, hi!' but the driver wrinkles his nose and walks away. I don't tip the mother fucker. I've parboiled in his backseat, smelled his sweat, and braced for impact more than once and he can't say hello to my brother? Fuck him. Jasper's face falls a little when the car pulls away and I don't know if he was waiting for Yellow or if he understands that the man didn't like him, but either way ... I hate to see his features stiffen that way. I tell him to sit down on the steps again and I pull of his shoes and put them on the right feet. He insists that he 'tie 'em' which takes five full minutes for each shoe because he has to hear the rip of the velcro until it's just right.

When we go inside ... my mother is cooking. I smell grease and flour and chicken and pie. She comes out of the kitchen wiping her hands on her apron and she's gained weight. I don't mention it as she hugs me. She leaves a spattering of flour on my shirt and asks me if I'm hungry. I'm really not, but it's Mom's Chicken and I'm Mom's Daughter so I agree that I'm famished. My dad joins us on the terrace under a canopy of umbrella and it's almost like old times. The biggest difference is that he skips the fried chicken in favor or grilled and eats yogurt for desert and not pie. Jasper finds everything interesting and stops eating to show me his fork (which is the same pattern we've had since before he was born), his watch (which I gave him for Christmas), and then he realizes that the ocean is crashing in the distance and his belly is full.

You really shouldn't swim right after you eat.

That's never stopped him before.

"LEE! SWIM!" He gets to his feet so fast that he bumps the table with the front of his thighs. The table is heavy wrought iron and he gasps when he feels it bite his flesh. "Ouch."

It's the most he can vocalize about pain. Ouch. One word accompanied by the screwing up of his face and the eye squeezing wrinkling that speaks of tears. "Jazz?" I say, "You want to swim?"

Pain forgotten. "Swim now!"

By the time I've changed into my suit ... he's already in the water. I find one sneaker here, one sneaker there. One sock here, one sock there. I gather it all and set it out of the reach of the licking waves. For a while ... this was her water. I showed her the ocean. I wish I could find the seashell that she was fascinated by. I wish I had plucked it from her hand and taken it to the jewelers in town so that they could have put a hole in it and slid a chain through it. She could wear the shell like I wear her.

I wish she was here now.

No, wait. I'm pissed at her. I wish that I had never met her.

Because if I had never met her ... I'd be here now with Mark and he'd probably be throwing me into the water and diving under to grab my legs. I can just see his shoulders glistening with sunlight and his graying hair slicked down with salt and fun. I can see him standing at the grill with my brother Joel while they drink beer and talk about who knows what and I can see me catching his eye and sharing a smile that tells him I want him to sneak into my room that night. And he would. I wish that could have happened. I wish this could have been his place, too.

I wish so many things.

I baptize myself in the Atlantic Ocean and stay under long enough to pray that God will change me and my life. That takes a while. I keep adding things to the list. Maybe I can break the record for holding your breath.

Jasper finally pulls me up because I've scared him by vanishing. He shakes me and says my name and maybe he remembers being under for a while, too. I should be careful what I ask for. He was baptized in the Atlantic Ocean by fire and wreckage and he left most of himself behind. I give him a smile and tell him I'm okay, but he's had enough of swimming now. We sit on the beach, watching boats cut across the horizon like a merry go round ... and he puts his arm around me so that I can lean against him.

It won't be the last time I lean.

It won't be the last time that I take notes on his strength.

As the days float by and I listen to my mother make the final plans for Jasper's twenty fifth birthday party ... my mood improves. I chase dolphins with my brother at night, my hand reaching out like his as we lie side by side in his bed. I let my mother spoil me with a trip to the salon where I get a cut, a manicure, and red toenails. It's my way of being bright and shiny for her and she thanks me with a shopping trip where she piles clothing in the dressing room and buys everything that fits me. I'll either have to ship it back to Seattle or buy a new suitcase for it all.

Or ... I could just stay. There's enough clothing to last and what's in Seattle anyway that I can't live without? Cristina can send anything valuable and donate the rest to charity. That's what I'm thinking as I spread out a towel and adjust my bathing suit as I flop face down on the sand. I pillow my head on my arms and close my eyes. It's Friday. I've been here four days and I'm not closer to clearing my head than I was. I've spent so much time in the sun that my skin has darkened at least three shades because I have tan lines and I never really get tan lines. I'm listening to the waves and wondering if Miami General's ortho department needs a helping hand when a shadow falls across me.

"Your mother just quizzed me about how many men I've slept with, whether or not I've slept with women, and whether I think you're pretty."

I push myself to my knees, stunned. "Addison!"

Her hair is still darker than I've seen it, but I can see the signature red bleeding through. "We both think I'm a slut now ... me and your mother. The number of guys I've slept with doesn't sound too bad until I say it to someone who tells me she's had one lover."

I smile and launch myself at her. She hugs me until I gasp. "What are you doing here?"

"Mark." She takes a step back and drops her heels in the sand. "Mind if I sit with you?"

Real friends don't need invitations to intrude. They appear when you need them and stay when you don't and wade into the cesspool with you ... even in Manolo Blahniks. She doesn't wait for me to tell her that she can definitely sit with me ... she just does it. She flops down on my towel without wiping the sand off and I want to tell her that she's going to get her swanky beige pants dirty, but I don't. I sit next to her. "I don't want to talk about Mark."

"Do you want to talk about Erica?"

"Mark didn't kill her, did he?"

"No." She takes her sunglasses off her head and slides them onto her nose. "He just wants to."

"You think I'm horrible, don't you?"

"If I thought you were horrible I wouldn't have come here." She brushes an imaginary piece of lint of her thigh and pulls her legs up, digging her toes in the sand. "He goes from hating you to loving you in zero to sixty right now. He was loving you when you he called me and that's why he wants me to tell you that if he can't make you happy then he'll bow out. Of course ... thirty minutes later he called and told me to tell you that he's sleeping with four nurses and had a threesome with two twins that he met at Joe's and he hopes that you fall into a shark's mouth and lose your pretty head."

"At least he called me pretty."

She pauses before she speaks. "Yeah."

"This isn't supposed to be my life, Addy. I'm not this person. I don't toy with people and I don't string people along so what am I doing? What the hell am I doing?"

"The same thing I did. I fell in love with two people. One was the love of my life and I would have died for him ... the other blindsided me and felt so good that I stopped thinking about what was right and went with it."

"When you left Mark to stay with Derek ... did you choose wrong?"

"I'd still be with Derek if Mark didn't exist. I'd probably have a baby and a minivan and a suburban house. I loved Derek. I loved him with everything in me. It just wasn't enough. And Mark is real." She looks at me. I can't see her eyes behind her glasses, but I know they've found mine. "And I'd still be with Mark if I could have let my guilt over what I did with him stop making me feel like I was being pecked to death by chickens every time he touched me. I couldn't, though. I loved him, too, but I couldn't see him as anything more than a dirty little secret most of the time."

"You chose yourself in the end."

"There is that ... but I have also worn out six shower heads and can't get up the nerve to move past flirting and into full frontal action with Pete."

"Pete?"

"The new guy." She makes a face. "The new ... not really guy."

"What's a not really guy?"

"The one you settle for when you've burned your bridges and chosen yourself." She glances out over the water. "I look at the ocean from my beach house and you know what I do? I second guess every decision, every word, every thing that made me wind up there alone."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that Mark probably really is sleeping with half of Seattle right now and that you didn't react at all when I told you that. I'm saying that Mark is a lovable guy, despite himself, and he doesn't deserve to look at his life one day and wonder if you're with him out of pity ... or because you want to be there. And I think if you are there, Callie, he's going to be even more alone than I am."

"You were right," I tell her. "Erica and I were a happy couple for like ... a blink of an eye. And I think maybe I'm fluent in the 'Vagina Monologues'."

And there it is.

That's the first time I admit out loud to anyone that I just may actually be a little bit ... less than straight.

I may actually be very, very curvy.

George once called me curvy.

He was right.

"HI, LADY! HI!"

Addison turns her head and watches Jasper hurry toward us. His hand is extended like she's a dolphin on his ceiling and I tell her that he's my brother. She stands up and introduces herself. If his difference matters at all to her ... she doesn't let on. I think I've underestimated people in my life. I kept him a secret the same way I kept myself a secret and the people who matter don't really bat an eyelash over what sets us apart. She laughs when he bends down and scoops sand into both her heels like they're shovels and when he touches her sunglasses, she hands them to him and he puts them on upside down before he rushes into the water.

He calls her 'Dyson'. That's what he hears of Add-i-son and that's what sticks.

When I ask her if she wants to stay through the weekend ... she says she was already planning on it.

My mother ... ever the Orgasm Controller ... will not put Addison in the room next to mine. She doesn't even put her on the same floor. She puts her in the room off the library where my father's parents would occasionally stay because they were too old for the stairs and when I say goodnight ... my mother stands in the hallway and steps on a squeaky board. It's her way of saying she will hear me if I go to Addison's bed and I slam my door in her face as a response. She likely thinks that I'm horny and don't want her maternal instincts to crimp my every-so-oh-my-god-gay-style ... but I'm actually just pissed. A mother's love is supposed to be the one solid foundation that you can stand on and I feel like mine is a rope bridge across a rocky gorge. If I misstep one time and embrace that I curve ... she'll buck me off and that's that.

She'll wash me off her hands the same way she washes flour off.

Am I ready to say goodbye?

Jasper's birthday party has a Transformers theme. I've never seen him play with Transformers and he got scared trying to watch the movie because of sensory overload, but that's what it is. It could have been a party for me. I'm transforming. Granted, I'm not as wicked cool as Optimus Prime, but I'm changing. Not necessarily for the better. I went from being a sleek sports car to being robotic. I'm tired of going through the motions and as Addison and I sit on the terrace and watch Jasper ride a horse in a circle ... something happens that makes the robot go away and the sports car come back with a V8 engine.

My brother Joel arrives and he skirts the table where I'm sitting. Trevor is allowed to run and greet me ... Hope keeps a firm grip on Savannah. My niece tugs twice to get away, but Hope hangs onto her so tightly that I see her hand turn red and she cries out. Her eyes meet mine and she reaches for me, but she's not allowed to love me. Or touch me. Or come to me.

The truth breaks over me.

They think their son is safe with me as his aunt ... but their daughter is not because I'm attracted to girls.

They assume that what they perceive as my sexual perversion extends to little girls.

I see Hope stalk to where my mother is standing and they both look my way. Hope is asking about Addison and my mother is emphatically shaking her head. I don't have to be close enough to hear it to know what's being said. The thought that I would bring another woman into the inner sanctum and possibly do something with her and taint Jasper's party is too much to take. The thought that I would be that gross and that horrible is enough to make me unworthy of my niece ... the baby that I held just moments after her birth with tears streaming down my face.

I'm finished crying over being me.

Most of the visitors in attendance are here from my parent's church. Jasper's nurse is here with her family, but it's a small affair, and they're all on the beach.

"I'll be back," I tell Addison and push myself to my feet. I lean down and kiss Trevor on the head and leave him asking Addy why her shoes are pointy.

Hope sees me coming toward her and gets a look on her face like she just caught a whiff of road kill. I ignore her and squat down by my niece so that I can give her a kiss. "Hey, Savvy!"

"Aunt Callie!" She flings one skinny little arm around me because her mother is still holding one. I pick her up to break the connection and she plants a wet smack on my cheek. "Jasper has a horse! Will you let me ride it?"

"Sure," I reply. I notice the way Hope's eyes go to my hand which is against Savannah's backside as I brace her against me. Is this how my life is going to always be? Are people really so ignorant that they assume unconventional love and perversion go hand in hand?

Who am I kidding? If I can't accept myself then how can I expect anyone else to?

I tickle Savvy and watch her bow up in a little knot and giggle, then she points out at the beach, where Jasper and his horse are now trotting. "Papa is out there!! I'm gonna go."

I set her on her feet and watch her pink and yellow dress flounce around her bony legs as she makes a beeline for my dad. He bends down to scoop her up and I watch him nibble at her neck while she yelps with joy. I'm smiling when I look back at Hope. "My money says that she's gonna be too scared to get near that horse."

It's as if I didn't say a word. Hope turns to the ice chest and digs herself a Coke from the depths and walks away. My mother clears her throat and shields her eyes as she looks out at the beach.

"Mom, why did you tell them?"

She keeps looking at anything but me. "I asked your brother to pray for you. I had to tell him why."

"Did you ask him to pray for me when I nearly died? How about when I moved in with Mark?"

"That's different."

"Of course it is."

"Hey, you made your bed, Calliope!" she snaps angrily. "You shocked us all by marrying someone you didn't even see fit to bring home and then you divorced him in less than three months. Then you bring some woman here and take her to bed and you expect us to ... what ... exactly? Not pray for you?"

"I don't need prayers! I need you!"

"What happened with you and Mark? I've asked you three times about him since you've been here and you clam up like you've lost your damn tongue."

"It's MY business. It's not yours!"

"Okay fine!" Mom yells. "Don't tell me anything. But don't expect me to come when you 'need' me because I'm clueless. I don't know what you 'need'. It's your business."

"You should not have told them!"

"If you're that ashamed of the truth then maybe it isn't YOUR truth." She finally looks at me and her brown/gray eyes are blazing. "You shocked us."

"You think I didn't shock myself?"

Lucky for me ... the only people still on the terrace other than my mother and me are Addison, Hope, and Joel. My voice is so shrill over the question, though, that I see several faces from the beach turn my way. I take a deep breath. My father is heading our way.

I turn and stalk into the house and a moment later the door is shoved open behind me. My parents file in ... and Joel. My father has the agitated look of a bull that just got slapped on the ass. "What is going on!?" he demands.

"Who is that woman out there?" Joel growls. "Callie, I don't want my kids around -"

"Me?" I cut him off. "You don't want your kids around me? You don't have to say it ... I see it."

"It's a sin!" he shouts.

"Well, you're no saint!" I yell back. "You don't fool me, Mr. Preacher! You only chose this path because you felt guilty for drinking when you crashed us! It wasn't some big fucking calling for you! Our lawyer told you to stop being a damn bum and 'find God'. So don't you dare condemn me!"

"Stop!" My father is rapidly building himself into a tirade. I see it coming.

Joel apparently doesn't. "Let me tell you something, Callie, I'm the one who has to live with that crash and I handle it the best I can! I made a bad choice and so did you so -"

"YOU THINK I CHOSE THIS!?" I can feel angry tears fill my eyes and I struggle not to let them fall. I don't want to cry! "I HATE THIS!! I HATE IT! I DIDN'T PLAN TO FALL IN LOVE WITH HER OR-"

"OH MY GOD!" My mother screeches. "LOVE!? YOU'RE IN LOVE WITH HER NOW!?"

I feel like the fight has been sucked out of me with a hose. I accept the truth by saying it out loud. "Yeah, Mom, I am. And I've stayed away from her ... I've fought with her ... I've fought with ME ... I've fought with Mark ... I've fought with you ... and she still wins whether I want her to or not." I close my eyes. "I didn't choose this. I can't think of a single person who would choose to live with this condemnation."

"God condemns it."

"Then let me answer to God, Joel, don't expect me to answer to you and keep in mind that you'll be answering for a few things, too." I feel my face fall and I hate it for betraying me. "I'm not sorry. I'm not. I wouldn't trade the time I had with her for your forgiveness, either."

"THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE!" My mother shouts. "IS IT OVER!? ARE YOU DONE WITH HER!?"

"NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!"

"NO! STOP! NO FIGHT!"

We all clap our mouths shut and look at Jasper. He is standing in the open doorway, his bare feet soaked and his shorts leaking urine on the welcome mat. My brain sees the mat and tells me that I've wet my own welcome, too. I hear a sound like two cats fighting in a pillow case and then gasp when Jasper seizes a picture from from the mantle and throws it against the wall. Candlesticks and potpourri and another picture frame follow suit and then he attacks a wing back chair, picking it up and hurtling it dangerously close to my brother.

It's weird the way that time stands still. We watched Jasper like he was the climax of a movie that we've been on the edge of our seat anticipating. None of us move. None of us CAN move, or breathe, or process what we were seeing. Jasper, see, has two moods: cheerful and sleepy. That's it. He will howl pitifully if you take something from him and cross his arms with his lip out for three whole seconds and then the storm is gone and he will smile. He cries silently when he's in pain or if his ice cream falls off the cone and those tears will still fall like a faucet for just a while longer than they should. The doctors said that his brain couldn't tell his tear ducts that it was time to shut down. Jasper never, ever, not since before the accident or since ... shows us rage.

It's a sight to behold.

His muscles grew from swimming and as he yanks the VCR from the entertainment center and pulls it from the wall ... I think that he's never been so handsome. Face contorted to express what he can't ... I hear him loud and clear and just before he can step into the shattered glass ... I take his hand. He looks down at our joined fingers and freezes. I see him swallow back the next scream of something and then he shows me his other hand, where blood is pooling in his palm.

"Ouch."

The storm has passed. Like a hurricane that races for shore and batters everything ... he has become the eye of it ... steady and eerily calm. "Be careful," I tell him, pointing at his feet. "Broken glass."

"Boken gas," he repeats, looking down. "Bad, bad fight."

"Yeah, bad fight," I agree. "You want me to fix the ouch?"

"You." He grins, big and beaming. His teeth are green from the icing on his cake. "Fix ouch."

I keep his hand in mine as I lead him to the bathroom. When I sit him down on the toilet he points at the wet crotch of his shorts. "Uh oh."

"I can fix that, too," I tell him.

"Fix you, too."

Now ... he could have been parroting what I said, but it doesn't feel that way. When I kneel in front of him and blot away the blood in his hand, he says it again. I look up at him and he trails his uninjured hand over my face the way that a blind person would to 'see' you. I feel like he's seeing me more than I have lately. He touches the tears that have yet to dry under my eye ... or maybe its the circle of misery underneath that catches his attention. he leans forward and kisses that spot. His breath smells like a strawberry lollipop and his lips are sticky. I feel a stirring in my stomach when he lowers his hand from my face and touches the heart necklace around my throat. I'm almost afraid that he will snap the chain, but he doesn't. He looks me in the eye and says, "Jazz kiss it."

He does.

He kisses MY heart ... the one I've been dangling from my own chains and puts a bandage over it the same way I put one on his hand. When I take him to his room to change his shorts, he picks up a comic book and shows it to me. "Yellow say 'Pow'!"

I goose him in the ribs the same way Erica did the night she read the comic book to him on her belly in the floor. It's the same book. He has it open to the page where Superman is throwing something toward a wall in order to get through it. There are shackles on his wrists that he pulled loose from a trap. It dawns on me, judging by the stickiness of the pages and the way it naturally stays open to that page, that Jasper has been looking at that drawing a lot. Jasper BECAME Superman downstairs when he emulated him by throwing whatever was at hand toward the wall that makes him a prisoner. He's more of a superhero, in his soiled shorts and bare feet, than I ever was in my Supergirl costume.

Because he commanded attention, put out the fire, and slipped back into his own world.

"Jazz?" I say, as I locate a pair of clean briefs. "You just might be a rock star. You know that?"

"Dock car!"

"Rock star."

"Sock rar!"

"Close enough." I dry him off with the towel that I carried with me and pull fresh underwear over his hips, then hold out shorts for him to step into. He holds onto my shoulders the same off balance way he did as a kid and I can remember being fourteen and he was four and he was shaking with urgency because going to bed early meant that Santa would come and I wasn't fast enough. "There you go, buddy."

"Buddy ... too." He pats my head like I'm a good puppy. "Lee ... happy!"

"I'm happy."

He makes a face and sums my life up in one word. "Lie."

He's got me there.

The little shit.

"I will be," I say.

"Horse!"

"Okay, okay. Go ride the horse."

"Go ride the course."

I watch him run in his own unique way. I have to keep riding the course. I have to stay the course. Whatever course I'm supposed to take.

If it's not supposed to lead me to her ... then why is her face on every sign?

Addison and I go out for drinks when Jasper goes to bed. She heard most of what transpired in the living room because her back was right against the window. She doesn't mention it as I drive toward the restaurant and I finally tell her that I'm sorry she had to be there for it.

"Don't apologize," she tells me. "God, I didn't realize that they - that you - what was it like when Lori Anne found you in bed with her?"

"Imagine going to sleep in complete bliss and waking up with the Devil glaring down at you. My mother cried ... like Jamie Carr cried when her baby died ... and then she kicked me out. Wouldn't even let me go to the hospital to tell my dad goodbye." I weave through traffic, thinking that my dad's Jaguar is ever so much better than my Range Rover. "It was the hardest day of my life. When I left ... I didn't know if they'd ever let me come back and ... well, they didn't, did they? They don't want me here."

"I think they're just ... shocked." She's staring at me. "Mark called me after that happened. He said that you were like a zombie and that it was because of him. He said that he couldn't take hurting you like O'Malley did. He said that you were mad at him, mad at Erica, and that you wouldn't get off the couch. This is why ... right?"

"Yep." I think about my next words carefully before I choose them. "I didn't speak to her the entire way home and when we did finally say something ... it was nothing but hurtful nonsense that we hid behind work to say. There has not been a day since we flew home together that I haven't wished I could do it again ... differently. I shouldn't have agreed to be with Mark just because it made him happy or ... my mother happy. I should have made myself happy and that makes me self centered, but I'd rather be self centered than responsible for this mess."

"I didn't realize that you were in love with her. I thought ... I dunno what I thought."

"That I was curious. That I wanted to experiment. That I wanted to test the waters and see what happened." I glance over at her. "I told myself that, too. For a long time. I loved her as a person and a friend before I ever touched her. And - I don't think that matters because even if I didn't know her, even it was a random one night stand ... I'd know her. I'd love her."

"You're in love." Addison says it with a smile. "What are you going to do about it?"

"I called her a whore before I left to come here. That pretty much sealed it, didn't it?"

"Mark said she showed up at the airport." Addy clears her throat. "Actually, what he said was 'I looked up and the fucking skank was standing there like a blond albatross'. But, she came."

"They both did." I clear my throat now. "She slept with somebody else. I went to her house the other day to tell her that I was leaving Mark and ... she had company."

"Ouch."

I smile, thinking of Jasper. "Ouch."

"But - you had someone, too, Callie. Imagine how that felt for her."

"I've done nothing but imagine how it feels for everyone. You told me yesterday that I didn't react when you told me about Mark and new conquests. You think I don't care ... but I don't have the right to a reaction. I have overreacted so much that I need to just ... not react at all. If sleeping around helps him ... then more power to him."

"But not her? She shouldn't?"

I tighten my grip on the steering wheel just thinking about the girl who called her baby. "No. She shouldn't."

"You get that you're fucked up, right?"

"That's old news."

We decide not to hit up the restaurant and I show her Miami's nightlife instead. The city comes to life with Salsa after dark. Gyrating bodies, heavy perfume, and the erotic thumps of body charging music will leave you lightheaded. I love Salsa and after ten minutes of being stiff as a board on the edge of the dance floor ... Addison is whisked off her feet by a guy who gardens part time at our house. His name is Israel, but he's known as El Diablo on the dance floor. He dances seductively and it really is a dance with the devil as you try to hang onto your panties when he grinds into you. I can tell that she is enjoying it as much as he is. I dance beside her ... with a man who touches me with a little too much familiarity and watch a girl with sand colored hair spin and show her thong.

Yeah ... I'm more interested in her.

Fuck. Me.

At three in the morning, I've had one mixed drink. Addison has had two fishbowls, four shots, and three jello shots ... that I've seen. I stand beside her outside the car while she pukes. When I try to strap her in, we bump heads because she's trying to take her strappy heels off. My own feet are being tortured in dancing shoes as well, but I take pity on her and pull hers off. I watch her rub the bottoms of her feet on the floor mat and laugh when she groans in ecstasy.

This should be fun.

Addison is a talkative drunk. And unexpectedly and quite shocking talkative drunks. I'm not prepared for what comes next. She tells me that she didn't call me during my zombie mode because she was a little pissed at me for dancing out of Joe's with Mark the day she visited Seattle. Her feelings were hurt because it was like I was staking a claim and making her see that she had been forgotten. I had a new best friend and Mark was going to fuck me blue. She was pissed, in short, because I broke the friend code by sleeping with him again at all. And for not realizing that she wasn't okay with it. I let her ramble and I know she's telling me the truth.

I ease onto the highway and point towards Casa Torres. Casa HELL. She keeps talking now, telling me that Pete is okay, but hard to figure out and he's sexy, but no Mark Sloan.

She didn't come here to talk me into being with Mark and I know that now. She still loves him.

That's what SHE says ... not me. She actually SAYS it. She loves him. Still.

And then she slugs me on the arm hard enough to make me swerve. I quickly right the car and tell her to knock it off.

You probably know what's coming, right?

I hear the siren before I see the blue lights and as I'm driving onto the shoulder, she turns in her seat and says, "BUSTED!"

"Shut up," I growl. "Do not say a word."

When the officer arrives at the window ... I know that we're Going. To. Jail. Call it sixth sense or a premonition, but I know it won't end well. I give him my dad's registration and elbow Addison back into her seat when she tries to get a good look at him. Her boobs are hanging halfway out of her dress and her eyes are so glassy they could be a mirror. She's trying to hum something seductive but it sounds like the Oscar Meyer wiener commercial and I'm so mortified when she whistles at him that I could DIE.

"Hi, occifer!"

"Addison, zip it!"

"She is soooooo mean to me," she warbles at the cop. She's now stretched across my lap like an oversized ankle biter so that she can see the man. "Wanna frisk me?"

I see him raise a brow and shake my head apologetically. "Don't mind her. She's from New York."

"So am I," the cop replies. "And your point is?"

"Uh," Shit. "I have no point."

"Something struck my car after being thrown from this one and you were swerving. Can you explain that?"

"I threw my shoe out," Addy announces. "I have BLISTERS!"

He scratches something on his note pad. "Littering."

"It's not litter! It's Prada!" she huffs. "I can toss the other one and call it a pair."

I make a promise to Baby Jesus right then and there to remain celibate for life if she will just. shut. up. "Addy, sit down!"

I tug at her dress and when that doesn't work, I grip her panties and give her a wedgie to end all wedgies. She screams and flails and for some reason that gives the officer probable cause to think she has drugs up her ass. Her chorus of 'get it out, get it out' doesn't help. He questions me with the passion of Matlock. Not that I watch that.

"Ma'am," he says to me when I finally wrestle her into the seat. "I need your license."

I reach for my purse, but it's not there. I look behind my seat, then hers and try to remember where I left the damn thing. "Uh - I can actually explain this and -"

"Step out of the car, Ma'am."

"Hahahahah!" Addison hits my shoulder again. "He wants to FRISK YOU! Lucccky!"

I open the door and stand up. "I think I left my purse at the bar."

"You been drinking tonight?"

"I had one drink. My alcoholic friend here drank the rest." I try to smile. I really, really try to smile, but alas, my mojo is broken. "I apologize. I have a Washington license and I can give you the number, but-"

"Hide the crack pipe!" Addison says suddenly when another cop car appears. "Fast!"

If alcohol poisoning doesn't kill her ... I will.

Within minutes we're both sitting in the back of his squad car while a shedding canine prowls around my dad's Jaguar looking for drugs. The mutt finds a bag of medication prescribed to my father and unpaid parking tickets that belong to my mother in the dash. And Barney Fife doesn't believe me when I say that my name is not Lori Anne and it is NOT my nature to collect points on my license like stamps the way mother does. He doesn't even bother with the breathalyzer or with making me touch my nose. I think that is due in large part to the island of vomit Addison spills into the backseat. He simply calls for a wrecker to come and get the Jag and hauls us in, telling me he knows my dad.

We don't literally get arrested, but it's close enough. The cop tells me on the way that he can't let me drive with no license. Addison looks like she could have been arrested for prostitution, though, because her boobs are still on display and she seems nonchalant about being put in a small room to wait for me while I call my dad. The yelling that Santos Torres does is loud enough for Erica to hear it allllll the way across the country and when I join Addy in the room ... she is still puking.

"Is this as bad as I think it is?" she whines, her red/brown hair sticky around her face for her efforts.

"Oh, you have NO IDEA!"

She heaves again and one hour becomes two and then three. My parent's house is forty minutes away and it's rapidly approaching six thirty in the morning before the door opens and my father is standing there. Addison is passed out over the trashcan, slobbering a little. He looks at her, then at me, and says, "If you HAVE to start rebelling, Mija, could you please do it during decent hours?"

He isn't smiling, but I can see that he wants to. I nod at him and he helps me with Addison. She slumps in the backseat and doesn't make a sound. I'm the one with the motivation to drink myself unconscious so what the hell is she doing?

I strap into the passenger seat and my dad starts the engine. He doesn't put it into reverse. I glance at him nervously and he says, "Did you drink and drive?"

"One drink before midnight. I was not intoxicated."

"Are you okay?"

"I guess it depends. Did you tell Mom?"

"Yes."

"I am so NOT okay."

"She's trying to understand you. We both are." He touches my hand, then covers it with his. "It'll work out."

"I don't think it will."

"I gently reminded your mother last night that her parents hated me for being Cuban. I reminded her of not being welcome in her home and of the way she felt during the holidays when it was just the two of us and we had nowhere to go. I may have pointed out that her family didn't care that she loved me ... just that my skin was darker. And I came out and said that I would not tolerate her doing the same thing to you."

"Thanks, Dad."

"Thank me by not going to jail again. You wouldn't do well in prison."

"She's a little gay," Addison speaks up, her words still slurred. "She'd be fine."

Dad chuckles and puts the car into gear. "There are worse things to be than a little gay," he tells me. "Ask her in a few hours when she wakes up how she feels."

"Like shit," Addy assures us.

I suffer my mother's wraith well.

She keeps her voice down as much as a flustered Southern Belle who has been jarred from sleep with an unwelcome phone call possibly can. The riot act she reads me is lengthy and she wraps verbal barbed wire around me only enough to make me cry just a little ... and then she fusses over Addison and forgets that she's pissed at me. She cooks me French Toast while Addison sleeps and then she tells me to go for a walk with her. I'm leery of being drowned because the ocean is lethal enough on its own, but I follow her. She barely reaches my chest she's so little, but I don't let it fool me. Petite people are more likely to be serial killers ... it's true ... I swear.

"I'm sorry," she tells me finally, when we're standing in the waves. "I was wrong."

The blisters on my feet protest the salt and I nearly protest her admission from shock alone. Did she really just say that? Out loud? "About what?"

"Did I ever tell you about Davis Buchannon the Fourth? The sheriff's son in Valdosta?"

She says it 'Buck-annon', not 'Bew-cannon'. I shake my head. "Sounds like an overall wearing, tobacco spewing old goat. Why?"

"That's the man that I let my parents talk me into dating after they talked me out of dating your daddy. Davis was the most handsome man in Valdosta and all the girls were jealous of me because I got to ride around town in his little convertible and hold his hand in the theater."

"Sounds scandalous."

"He put a ring on my finger that felt like a noose. I tolerated him for seven months and then I came to Miami and threw that ring in the ocean. I walked into Santos's office and asked him if he still wanted me like I wanted him and we got married the next day."

I grin at her. "Were you a virgin?"

"That's not the point, you nosey jackass." She turns a little red around the neck. "The point is ... I lost seven months with him and when he nearly died ... I sat there wishing I could get those seven months back since I had squandered them." She reaches across the water and takes my hand. "I will never, ever understand why you would even consider the path that you're on. It's going to be hard on you and if the people who love you can't even tolerate it then the people who don't love you will crucify you ... but I have to let you make a life for yourself. As much as I want to kick your ass for it ... I'll settle for kicking hers if she hurts you because she'd be easier to take than Mark."

I have to laugh at that. "I don't know. She's pretty feisty."

"I do not want to know!"

"I'm not talking about sex!"

She makes a face and now she's fire engine red. I watch her rub a hand over her head and I realize that my mother is getting old. As much as I hated her the day she made me leave home with Erica ... she's from a different generation and a different culture than what she raised me in. Dad gave us his customs and maybe she turned her back on everything but the Southern cooking because her well of breeding was poisoned with intolerance, too. And ignorance. My first and only real memory of Lawrence Allen Chisum, her father, is of him telling me I was cursed to look like a 'damn Mexican'. Then he walloped me good on the backside when I told him to buy a 'damn globe'.

My dad had gotten in his face over that, but they had stopped just shy of coming to blows. Mom was pregnant with Jasper and my dad walked on eggshells for her comfort the entire time she was. We never really interacted with Mom's family after that. She was ostracized and I guess it was because Santos Torres stole something that Davis Buchannon the Fourth never had a shot of finding. I never knew that my parents had broken up for a while, either. I learn a little something more every time I come home.

"Calliope?"

"Mom, I realize that you suffered forty hours of labor with me, but can you NOT call me Calliope? It sounds like a disease."

"Callie sounds like a puppy." She shrugs. "Can I ask you something?"

"Yep."

"When you're ... with women ... does it not feel wrong? Does it not ... lack certain things?"

"Do you mean a penis?"

"Honestly, Calliope! Such talk!"

"No ... it doesn't feel wrong. And it doesn't lack anything." I lean down to pick up a seashell. I tell myself that it's the one Erica had that day. I hold onto it. "And I've only been with one woman."

"How many men have you been with?"

"MOTHER!"

"Well, if it's as many as your loose friend Addison then it's no wonder you gave up on them! There are no men left!"

"How many did she say?"

"Twelve."

"Hmmm ... I've got her beat."

"I'm sorry I even asked."

"No, you're not."

We walk together until ten that morning. We watch birds and I chase her with a dead fish and it gets better. When we head back to the house, I say, "Has Jazz ever had a tantrum like that before?"

"No," she replies. "Never. I think all the yelling got to him, sweetheart, and he just couldn't take it."

"When I was helping him in the bathroom ... for just a second ... it was like he was back. He knew what to say to me."

She puts her arm through mine. "I see glimpses of him all the time. Every single day that goes by ... he learns something new."

"I miss him," I tell her softly. "I wish-"

"Wishes are what you have when your hands are empty. He keeps mine so full that I don't wish for anything but his smile." She tightens her grip. "And yours, too. I have faith."

"Joel will never come around."

"He will when I get your father's belt and make his legs pop Dixie."

I laugh. "What does that even mean?!"

"Go to jail again and I'll show you."

El Diablo, the man who danced with Addy until she her boobs blossomed out of her dress, brings my purse home. I left it at the table and nothing it missing, but he phone number is tucked in the side for 'Red'. Addison's flight is scheduled to depart at nine. I wake her up at five and tell her all about my mother's runny eggs and gristle filled sausage. It does what I hoped it would and I sit on her bed to enjoy the dulcet tones of her stomach rocketing through her nose. Payback, I've been told, is a specialty of mine. I finally take pity on her and wet a cloth. Jasper hears the commotion and comes into the bathroom with us. He rubs her on the back and says, "There, there, Dyson."

Addison groans.

"You do suck like a vacuum," I tell her.

What I don't tell her is that she admitted her feelings for Mark to me. I don't tell her that I found her picture in a suit coat he keeps in his closet and I don't tell her that I thought at times he was with me because I was connected to her. I don't tell her that I'd love for her to come home to Seattle and make him hate me less or that I think she's flailing in California with her Pete who isn't really her Pete. I bite my tongue and tease her relentlessly about the officer and let her think she played with his nightstick and when she hugs me goodbye at the airport, I don't cry. She doesn't either. We stand there looking at one another and I'm envying her for going back to normalcy and she's envying me because I had the life that could have been hers for a while. When she tells me that she loves me and to call her ... I say it back.

I buy a ticket for myself to depart on Wednesday and then stand outside until I'm sure she's in the air. Addison Montgomery is still my friend. She's no longer my BEST friend, but she's the kind of friend I'd go to jail for and only want to really kill about five percent of the time. I know her past better than I know her present and I don't know where I fit in her future ... but I still want her in mine. For the long haul. I pull out my phone and text her. I tell her that I miss her already and that I can't wait to see her again.

Sometimes we need to watch someone get piss drunk to realize that humans are stupid enough to intoxicate ourselves even though we know what the end result will be. It's because the threat of spending hours on your knees and even more hours with a marching band in your head isn't bad enough to make you give up the buzz after you take a few gulps. I was intoxicated by Erica ... and the threat of fallout or closets or ridicule or even losing my family down to fragments really isn't enough to make me not do it.

I have to try.

In my car, I whip out my Blackberry and text her. 'I just wanted to let you know that I'm sorry for calling you a whore. I didn't mean it and I'd like to tell you that in person. I'm flying home on Wednesday. Can you meet me at Warren's Pub?"

I sit there baking in the Miami sun with the top down on my mother's BMW (dad's Jag will be impounded until Monday) and I finally give up on a reply and start the engine when my phone vibrates.

Oh my God ... it's her!

'I can't on Wednesday. I have plans. What about Thursday? I can pencil you in at four thirty if my last surgery goes well. We can grab a beer at Warren's.'

Oh my God ... she has plans.

With her I'm sure.

And pencil me in? What the fuck is that shit? Like I'm asking her to give me a checkup. And why does she want to meet me at four thirty instead of say ... seven-thirty? Does she have plans then, too. Whether it's the heat of the sun or the fury that propels my fingers is beyond me. 'You know what? Forget I asked. Don't 'pencil me in' your cramped calendar, Social Butterfly, because the olive branch is now up your ass.'

She responds immediately. 'Kinky, Social Outcast. I'll see you Thursday."

Bitch doesn't even acknowledge my freak out! And I swear to God I bet she smirked at the phone and silently roared in triumph!

I buy a lilac bush on the way home and tell Jasper to bury it in the sand. He can't possibly dig a hole deep enough to get her out of my system, but I watch him try. I even HELP HIM. We dig and dig and dig some more and then my mother comes to the beach and rescues the plant before I can trash it. She tells me she fears for my sanity and hauls it up to the house where I'm sure she will nurture it to full bloom.

I sit down in the sand, pissed at the world, and let Jasper take off my shoes and bury them instead. When I say goodbye to him on Wednesday ... he asks me if I'm going to 'scoo' now.

School.

College.

Does he remember me leaving for school and him wrapping his eight year old arms around my waist and telling me to hate it and come back home fast? Does he remember calling my dorm and asking if it was over yet three days after I got there? Does he remember sleeping in my bed for a month to keep it warm for me and not letting my mother clean anything so that it was just the way I left it? Does he remember anything about what we were or is he just projecting his own 'scoo' on me ... where he paints every sheet of paper blue in the church's nursery once a week and calls it home.

I don't let myself hope too much. He grabs my suitcase and hauls it outside like he's glad to see me leave and then he sits on the steps and rubs and rubs his shorn head, stopping only to let me kiss him. He watches the cab arrive and greets the same fucking driver who dropped me off. I didn't tip the guy last time so I brace myself for payback. My parents hug me and then Jazz stands up and follows suit. "You go bye?"

"Yeah, Buddy, I gotta go home.'

His forehead wrinkles and he points at the mansion that surrounds us. "Home. One. Seven. Four. Bay. Island. Cove."

It stuns me so much that I drop my purse. He says 'whoops' and grabs it before I can. My mom just pats my hand and says, "I told you about wishes, honey. Wishes and faith are two different things, but they can both pull you through to the end."

I'm thinking about wishes and faith when I turn to watch the house disappear.

I'm full of both.

I wish Mark the best.

And I have faith that Erica wishes for me.


	8. Chapter 8

Warren's Pub is exactly as nondescript as it sounds. I'm pretty sure the original Warren has been dead since the eighteen hundreds because there's a bar, a few ramshackle tables and booths, and a shelf full of booze, but not much else. Nothing is on tap ... it's all in bottles. I don't think the place is dirty, really, but it's not The Emerald City Bar. There isn't even a neon sign and the brightest light in the place is the one bulb that hangs down in the middle of the bathroom and even then ... you have to squint to see what you're doing. I like it because most of the employees at Seattle Grace are too snooty to hang out here. I see the occasional intern and a nurse or two trickle through, but it's mostly bikers, fishermen, and truck drivers. That makes me the object of every stare when I walk in on Thursday wearing a tank top and tight jeans. I've got my leather jacket over my arm, but it's there for show because it's warm outside and the sun is shining. It's my outward way of saying 'maybe I drive a truck, too, so don't fuck with me', but my tits make a louder announcement and someone catcalls. I scowl in that direction and flip my hair, which I spent three hours curling in the mirror ... before I walk to the booth in the corner and sit down. The seats are padded, but ripped and when I slide onto it ... I feel ten thousand pounds.

It's only four o'clock and I think the next thirty minutes may feel heavier than I do.

Erica hasn't called me. She hasn't texted me. She hasn't confirmed our tentative plans where she penciled me the fuck in like a dental appointment.

You know what? Fuck her.

I should just leave and go get piss drunk at Joe's and find some random person to have sex with. Maybe a girl. Maybe that's exactly what I'll do and then -

"Torres."

I freeze in the middle of grabbing my purse. She's early. I take a steadying breath before I look up at her and when I do ... that breath catches in my throat. She's wearing her hair down and it's curly like it was on the beach. It's carelessly curly and I feel dumb as hell for spending so long curling mine into big fake Shirley Temple shitlets that I could die. Hell, I burned my fucking ear. Three times. That was such a sign. "Hey." Yeah, there I go saying everything I want to say. Watch me roar.

She looks from my face to my hair and then grins as she drops her purse and sits across from me. The bitch probably thinks I did it for her ... to impress her. And she's right. I hate her. I squirm uncomfortably and she finally takes pity on me. "How is Jasper?"

"Fine."

"And your family?"

"Okay."

"Can you tell me how you are with more than one word?"

"I'm tired."

"Jet lag?"

"You lag."

"Is that your way of saying that I suck?"

"No, Erica, it's my way of saying that you exhaust me." I stop talking when a waiter in a stained shirt walks up and asks what we want. "Water."

"Beer," she says, looking at me curiously. "Water? Seriously?"

"I spent the wee hours of Sunday watching Addison puke and trying to figure out if we were going to be booked for -"

"WHAT!?"

She yells it so loudly that several heads turn our way. I'm suddenly feeling very much like phlegm under a microscope. "What is wrong with you?"

"Addison was there?"

"Yeah ... she came for Jasper's birthday party and -"

"Fuck you, Callie."

I watch with shock and abject horror when she gets to her feet and grabs her purse. "Wait! What the hell are you -"

She's stalking across the seedy little place before I can get my thoughts together. I pull a twenty from my purse and leave it on the table to cover her beer and the commotion and run after her. This is absolutely not going the way I planned. Granted, I'm mad as hell at HER, but that doesn't necessarily mean that I want her mad as hell at ME. I wait until we're in the parking lot before I say her name again. She's parked her Lexus beside my pathetic excuse for a Range Rover (I'm not the world's greatest driver so it's got more dings than dongs ... pardon the pun) and she whirls around to face me. "You would dare call me a whore in front of EVERYONE?! When you-"

"Oh ... you're still mad about that?" I hold my hands up in surrender. "Okay ... okay ... I get that and I see your point and like I told you the other day ... I am very sorr-"

"Did you fuck her again?"

"Huh?"

"Addison! Did you fuck her again!?"

I can feel my eyes widen in shock and I self consciously look around us like the implication of me having sex with Addison will suddenly make a flock of buzzards fall to their deaths. "What in the hell are you talking about!?"

"Sloan told me! He told me allllll about your 'best friend' and how the two of you had sex with him and then each other while he watched!" She crosses her arms over her chest and I swear to God she does it to keep from hitting me. "I knew it. That first night with you ... you played dumb, but you knew exactly what you were doing. You took control and I. Knew. It. So fuck you! Go to hell!"

"Wait!" I grab her arm and then let go a lot faster because her looks could kill and now I'm mostly dead. "I have never slept with Addison and if Mark said that to you then he's either imagining things or he's trying to get to you."

"If Mark said it? You calling me a liar now? Because you covered whore and you made me feel like every other horrible thing you can possibly say ... so ... fuck off."

I stare at her for what feels like an eternity. I had forgotten for just a second how blue her eyes are. They're like the sky ... only deeper. And her hair ... it's the kind of hair that begs you to touch it. My hands feel as empty as my soul when I realize that I actually did more damage than I can undo by sulking and ranting and trying to get my way. "I didn't sleep with her," I repeat, then turn and walk away.

I quickly realize that my car is next to hers and I look like a complete ass as I walk toward ... nothing. I decide to save face and walk around the block because that will give her time to leave and time for me to cry and not bore her with the details of my pain. I'm just past the front door of Warren's Pub when she falls in step beside me. An entire half block passes and I can't tell you what the scenery is or what some random guy says when he yells out the window ... but I can tell you exactly what lilacs on a light breeze smell like and how soft her hand feels when she swings her arm next to mine and touches me. The smell is enough to calm me like a warm bath and her skin is like a cool touch on fevered skin. Hot and cold. Story of me. At the halfway point, I hear her sigh, but I don't look at her because if she's crying I'm going to snap like Jasper did in the living room on his birthday, but I won't throw things ... I'll throw myself at her and I can't do that yet.

"Callie, this is not us. We're not these women who do this to each other. We're not. So ... if you say that you didn't sleep with her -"

"I did say it."

"- then I believe you."

I stop walking. My arm is sweating under my folded jacket and I want to kick myself for bringing it along like a cow ass accessory could ever be a shield when you're in a war over hearts and who rightfully owns them. "I don't know what to say now."

"Well, we can try for casual conversation because -"

"No. I'm not making small talk or circling this issue anymore." I pull on every ounce of courage that I have to say what comes next. "You slept with that woman and -"

"OFF LIMITS!"

Okay, for her to tell me that her sex life is off limits after she just grilled me about Addison ... well, that pisses me off. See, this is exactly why I forwarded through the drama on 'The L Word' and went right for the porn. I'm not trying to fight with her or have angst out the ass ... what I want is for her to tell me that her little fling was just a fling and that she's over it. I sometimes suffer a disconnect between my brain and my tongue, though, and I am wholly not responsible for what comes next. "Forget it then. You go your way ... I'll go mine and then everything can be off limits. You damn pain in the ass."

"You need to not go to Miami. You become a child every single time you do."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Well, let's see ... you became a sullen infant on the flight home last time and wouldn't speak to me. Now you've graduated to toddler and you're trying to make me feel bad for something that you did first. You were with Mark and -"

"No, I wasn't."

"Riiiiight."

"I didn't sleep with him at ALL after Miami. I didn't sleep with him ... until the night I came to your house. After I left your house."

I see something in her face then. It's hard to look at it and not hug her. She looks like a balloon that is slowly losing its air ... and the painted face on the outside deflates down to nothing. "You did it to punish me."

"Punishing you would be telling you that from start to finish we used twelve condoms and I got off so many times I was like a rag doll." I challenge her with a raised brow.

She wasn't supposed to rise from that.

"Nice," she says. "Then I don't feel bad for telling you that the convenient girl is pretty damn amazing and I like her a lot."

Okay.

I can't rise from that.

I can't rise from that so much that I lean back against a light pole and put my hands on my stomach to keep my insides from boiling out. We stand that way, her regal, her spine straight ... and me with my shoulders slumped and my jacket held in my crossed arms like it could protect me after all. Traffic goes by and I don't care that we're in the bad part of town or that I should apologize or maybe tell her that the convenient girl will never love her the way I do. I used to think that the Grand Canyon was between us but now I know that she's one planet and I'm another and the space between us can't be breached in our lifetime. The sadness of goodbye is that you tell yourself you have to say that word before you can say hello again ... but there's a reason why it hurts so bad to say it at all.

"I'm sorry," she finally says. It's a whisper, but I still feel it against me. It cuts instead of cleanses. "I didn't meant to-"

"That night I came to your house ... I was there to tell you that I love you. I was there to tell you that I'm in love with you and I couldn't let Mark touch what belonged to you. I had this big speech about how you're in my head, but you live in my heart. I wanted to tell you ... that smelling your shampoo in the hallway can take a bad day and turn it around and I wanted to make sure you knew to be careful with me because I'm scared of you and what you make me feel." I look at her and her eyes are full of tears. My own have sand in them. "I think maybe I'll love you for the rest of my life and I came here today to see if you wanted me to, but -"

"Callie, I d-"

"No ... don't say anything else. Because if you say that you don't want me ... I'm gonna bleed to death before you can even find the wound. And if you say that you do want me ... I'm gonna hurt your feelings because you're with her and there are a million hateful things I want to say." I push myself off the pole and take a deep breath. "So ... I'll see you at work and ..."

She stalks toward me so fast that I back up like a coward. Her jaw is set, her mouth is a thin line, and then she's on me. It's teeth, tongues and my back against the pole until every inch of her is against me. Her fingers go into my hair and it doesn't matter that it's sprayed and gelled and hard with finish ... she finds a way to tangle herself in it until my scalp tingles from her nails raking against it. One of her legs slide between mine and I swear to God it's enough to lift me the two inches she has on me in height and all of my weight seems to settle at the meeting of my thighs. I'm vaguely aware that our breathing is labored and that I will probably need a paper sack to breathe into if this really is goodbye and then she's backing up and I'm the deflated balloon now. She moves her leg and I drop harder than if I had fallen fifty feet.

Her eyes are on mine when she says, "Come with me."

In a complete daze, I take the hand she holds out and we cross the street. Imagine the motel in every scary movie, the one with half the vacancy light blown and the cracked pavement parking lot that is full of cigarette butts, and the creepy slow eyed man behind the counter who doesn't look at anything but your tits. Yeah, that's what Seattle Skyline Inn looks like, but I don't really notice any of that because she's a little in front of me and I can see the swell of her ass and the way her hips swing like a pendulum of sin. My mouth is dry and my heart is pounding and what I didn't expect was to ache so much that I'm crying by the time she unlocks Room 205 and pulls me in behind her, but that's exactly what I'm doing and it dawns on me that I've cried enough over her and FOR her that she doesn't need to see the Ocean again ... I've given it to her with my pain.

She snatches my jacket and my purse, slinging both onto the table and when she pins me against the wall ... I'm ready for her. I drag her hips to mine and we kiss hungrily, pushing and pulling and straining at each other until my shirt is torn and hers is up around her neck. She leans back to yank it free and then she has mine gone in the blink of an eye. I didn't wear a bra again, hey, I'm pretty perky, and she doesn't touch my breasts gently at all. She squeezes hard enough to make me cry out in pain. I push her away angrily and reach for the strap of her bra because I want to peel it from her slowly and ... she beats me to it and her bra hits me in the face while she kicks off her shoes. I watch, holding my breath, as she exposes every milky white inch of her skin, her bra still hanging on my head. When she's naked, she rolls her eyes and snatches it off me. My hair snags and I can feel roots rip from my scalp.

"Fuck!" I hiss, my hand going to my head. "What the hell is wrong with you!?"

She replies by reaching for the button of my jeans and deftly opening them. This is not the slow, sensual and wonderful exploration I thought it would be. I'm in a motel room where the curtains might have been green at one time, but they're gray with dust and age now. I can see through the carpet in spots and even her lilacs can't mask the smell of mothballs and sweat. Her nails scraping my hips causes me to hiss and I put my hands over hers before she can push my jeans down. "No. Not like this."

"Like what?"

"It's horrible. You- you're not -."

"You want to leave?"

"I just don't want you to be so -"

"There's the door."

My body, for the record, revolts at the thought of stopping. My feet will not walk me across the room to get my shirt. They stay glued to the spot. I can't control my hands, either, and when I watch them move to her breasts ... I feel like maybe they're possessed and I'm not really in control. I think maybe I've never been in control because I should be mad as hell about how she's treating me, but I let her. With the decision obviously made, she pulls my pants down and trails her hand over the Wonder Woman boy shorts I'm wearing. Shit ... does that prove how much I wasn't expecting this?

She doesn't smile at them. She doesn't make a joke about my stupid comic books or tell me they're sexy. All she does is hook her fingers around the waist and pull them down. It's not even a pleasant experience. I swear on my Wii that she goes through the motion of it like she's not undressing forever the way I want her to be and when I step out of them ... I feel too exposed. I feel bashful and not petite like YOU KNOW WHO and I hate that she's looking at me with just a little contempt. I don't really understand it.

And then I'm flat on my back on the bed and I wonder where she's been hiding her muscles because I'm down for the count. She's on top of me and she pins both of my arms over my head. She doesn't do it by threading our fingers ... she does it by holding my wrists hard enough to bruise them. And it wouldn't suck if I could just UNDERSTAND it all, but when I say her name she kisses me again and her tongue rolls against mine like sandpaper ... I don't hate it ... but I do. It's cheap. The whole thing between us has now been reduced to the seventy nine dollar room and the knotty comforter against my back and the urge she has to make me miserable. She's making feel as dirty as the motel we're in and when she shoves her fingers into me ... I'm not wet. I'm not ready. I'm not anything.

That doesn't stop her.

She stares down at me with a look of ... vengeance ... as she slams those long digits in and out of me. I know that she can see that she's hurting me and I can see that she doesn't fucking care. I finally grab her shoulder, then her arm and stop her. "Don't!"

"Isn't this how Mark does it? Isn't this what makes you come more than you ever have? Until you're a ragdoll?"

"Why are you doing this to me?"

"This is how a whore does it."

I push her away and sit up. The room feels like a burning, overused oven and I'm sweating where her chest touched mine, where our legs twined together. "I said I'm sorry. I don't know what else to say. I'm sorry."

"Yeah." She slides down and sits beside me, her thigh against mine. It's narrower than mine and my tan makes her look even paler ... we're like ebony and ivory with less singing. None of me is singing right now. "You asked me to be careful with you, Callie, but you weren't careful with me."

"I know."

"And your pretty speeches about what you feel for me ... they're hollow. You - you made me hollow." She trembles a little. "All my life ... I've been afraid to love anything. When Rachel died ... I hated her for leaving me because she let me let my guard down and never made me regret it until right then. I needed her and she was gone. So, I hate her stupid dog because I can't really hate her. And you ... you let me love you out loud for two fucking days and I tried to hate you, but I couldn't, because you were sick and I missed my best friend. I want to hate you now, though. I can't touch you the way I did because he's all over you."

"He's not."

"She's all over me."

If a dagger has to be in my heart ... can't it just be still and not repeatedly stab me? Really. I only have so much of a sense of humor. "You're with her? In a relationship?"

"Sometimes."

That's all the wind that my sails need to move. I dart across the room and pull my tank top on. The side of it is ripped and she's stretched it until it hangs from me, but I don't care. I pick up my panties and pull them on and reach for my pants, but she slides them toward her with her foot. I take two steps closer to her than I want to be and she stands up, trapping the leg of my jeans under her bare feet. I blow my hair out of my face and say, "Listen, Erica, you are two seconds away from-"

"God, you're beautiful."

"Do not even try it, Hahn! The moment has passed!"

"Have we? Passed?"

I stand there clutching one leg of my pants while she stands on the other. This tug of war is nothing new to me. I go back and forth with her when she's not even there. I've been going back and forth with myself, too, and it stings bone deep that I can't pull both of us out of the Pit of Perpetual Pussification that we're both in. THIS IS NOT US! We're stronger than this, braver than this, but we've become cowards who check into a seedy motel and tear each other apart because we'd rather tear than be torn.

"Let go," I finally say softly, tugging at the denim.

"I can't." Reaching out, she touches my face, then my curly hair. "I can't, Callie. And I can't make her you. That's all I do with her ... I pretend."

"Then stop."

"Okay."

That shocks me. "Okay?"

"I'll stop."

She takes a step toward me and when she kisses me now ... its tentative ... just like our first kiss. This ... this could seduce me, but she pulls away. "Erica -"

"I'm really sorry. I say things before I think about it."

Ugh. Let me stay pissed. Let me stay pissed. Let me stay pissed. "I have the same problem."

Lifting my hand, she kisses it and I freaking melt when she looks at me over it and says, "I miss you. All the time."

"I have that same problem, too." If I can't be pissed then let me be slightly annoyed.

"Do you want to come to my place for dinner tonight? I'll throw something together and we can talk."

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is how fucked up my life is. The woman went from mauling me to molesting me and now we've arrived at something so mundane as an invitation and the truly messed up part is that I agree to go. Even though I can't go another round with her. Not today. I agree to go so that she will let me LEAVE. She spent seventy nine dollars to drive home the point that she's got the upper hand and I freakin' followed her like a calf to slaughter. She killed a little piece of me. Something has changed between us. I don't know if it's her tough exterior going back into place or if she's hell bent on making me walk through hot glass to get to her. All I know is that I apparently un-did us enough that she's leveling the battlefield until she decides I'm punished enough.

It's enough.

I get it.

I cry the entire way home.

Lying on the couch makes sense.

It makes a lot of sense to flop down and stare at the ceiling because it's the only thing that can't possibly fall on me right now. There are spider webs on it and a small hole where Cristina rammed the broom handle through it after the people above us had a fight at four in the morning. I'm not sure if I had a fight with Erica or what the hell that shit was. It felt sort of like a fight when it was happening and sort of like a good mangling by a Pit Bull. My heart hurts ... it feels like Cristina put her broom handle through it when it started making too much noise, too. My cell phone alarm goes off ... reminding me that I told Erica I'd be at her place tonight. I have an hour and a half to get ready and go.

I still don't move.

I hit the snooze and listen to it go off every ten minutes for thirty minutes. I have an hour left to find clothing, fix my hair (I faced the fact that it's horrible after the last curl was wound into place), and drive the twenty four miles to her house. My lack of motivation stems from the fact that I don't want to be where the brown haired girl who is pretty amazing and a little convenient and pretending to be me has been. I just ... don't. I don't want to sit where she's sat or eat where she's eaten or ... trespass on what could technically still be hers. Erica said she was ending it, but who the hell knows? I don't. I just can't be there and I can't call and say, "I'm cancelling because I can't stand the thought of picturing HER all over your house so I'll see you around, 'kay?'. I can't do anything but stare at the ceiling and think and be. When do you stop being and start BEING? I want to live in all caps instead of this whisper.

Someone knocks at the door and I sigh.

It takes me a full minute and three more raps on the door to push myself upright and trudge toward it. I pull my robe a little tighter (hey, you'd shower too if you had been felt up in roach hell) and when I open the door ... my eyes widen. "Hey, what are you -"

Mark holds up a box. "You left some stuff at my place. Cristina said you were home so ... here."

There's something so final about seeing all that's left of a chapter of your life haphazardly tossed into a medium sized Pop Tarts shipping box. I see concert tickets that I meant to throw away, a couple of hair scrunchies, a book that I had been reading and left open on the nightstand, and ... the photos of us from the photo booth in Canada. He used to have them in his locker. I pick the photo up and glance at him. He isn't looking at me ... he's looking at my hand ... and what we were. Smiling, kissing, laughing, playing. That's not us now. "I'm sorry, Mark."

His eyes meet mine. "Are you?"

"Yes."

"You should be."

"I know. Look ... do you want to come in?"

With one curt nod, he walks past me. I watch him stalk to the living room and sit down and I know that this could potentially be worse than what happened earlier in the day with Erica, but I'm still acting like a calf being led to slaughter. I deserve it, God, I get it. I set the box on the end of the counter and ask him if he wants something to drink. He replies that he doesn't and I sit down across from him. When he doesn't talk ... I know it's my cue to say something. "Look ... I get that you have every right to be pissed at me and to even hate me, but -"

"I don't hate you." He leans back, rigidly, in the same chair he sat in for two days when I was practically comatose. "It'd be a hell of a lot easier if I did."

So much of my life lately has been one extreme to the other. I'm either full of silent reflection or I'm screaming at the top of my lungs to make those reflections heard. Most of the silences are uncomfortable and I squirm with my thoughts ... but sitting here with Mark ... we share the fact that we're mute and it wears like a comfortable t-shirt. It dawns on me ... as he gazes out the window at our entire lack of a view ... that maybe he likes to smell my cherry blossom soap the same way I like to smell her lilacs. Maybe he finds solace in the sound of my breathing the same way I did with her and maybe sitting in the same room with me makes it hurt a little less for him.

"I didn't really sleep with that nurse with one tit."

"I know."

"And I don't really wish you'd die in a blazing car crash that chars every inch of you until there's nothing left."

"That's oddly soothing."

"But I did have a threesome with twins and I'm pretty sure I'm keeping the nurses happy enough not to sue me."

"Do you feel better?"

"Not really."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

There's quiet again.

When he sighs, his chest looks huge. "What did I do wrong, Callie?"

"You didn't do a single thing wrong. I couldn't have asked for a better boyfriend. You were everything I should have wanted and I'm very, very sorry that I couldn't be that for you."

"Hahn is not even pretty. She's uglier than a goat's ass."

"Uh ... you do remember spending weeks trying to sleep with her ... right? You do remember asking me to help you out."

"I wanted to sleep with her brain ... which ... ew ... that ... sounded less disgusting in my head."

I laugh when he does. It almost feels like old times ... when he was my friend and we could say anything at all to one another. This is the same man who viewed my happiness as his most important task of the day after I divorced George. He's the same man who used to regale me with stories that I know he made up, but it made me laugh anyway (I'm fairly certain that neither Shepherd or Sloan would have lived through being chased by Big Foot in the New York woods). This is Mark. The first guy I ever told about Jasper and the only one who accepted my parent's money without batting an eye. This is Mark ... who not only loved me ... he changed himself so that I could love him back without worry.

I miss the friend he was to me.

And I think I'll miss the man he became just as much.

"Addison told me about the jail in Miami."

"I'm surprised Addison remembers the jail in Miami. That woman nearly got us booked for the sheer volume of her stupidity alone." I laugh again. "She was very amusing in that ... 'I want to kill you later' kind of way."

His smile fades and he looks back out the window. "She also told me about your family and how they treated you. That's not right."

"You want to know what else is not right, Mark? You telling Erica that I slept with Addison. I know why you-"

"That bitch told me that you were having an affair with her all along! She told me that all the nights you hung out with her -"

"That's not true and you know me better than that."

"Do I? Here's a newsflash for you ... I didn't even know that you were bisexual."

Hmmm. Bisexual. Something that isn't straight. Something that isn't gay. I can't deny that one. "Well, neither did I!"

"So you didn't cheat on me the whole time?"

"If it makes you feel better ... I have only been with one woman. I spent two nights with her in Miami ... and only two nights ... and I haven't don't anything since."

"And you're in love with her."

"Yes."

"But not me?"

You know what? This is actually worse than what Erica put me through earlier. At least she was physically punishing me ... this is a boxing match of the soul. "I love you, too. I didn't lie to you when I said it. It's just that ... I didn't expect her, you know? I didn't expect to look at her one day and want her. It's sorta ... well, you love Derek and-"

"I am not IN LOVE with Derek! And the thought of that is worse that her face!"

"Can you hear me out?"

"Fine."

"You love Derek. He's the best friend you've ever had and you would probably die for him and not think twice about it. That love you feel for him, though ... it didn't stop you from sleeping with his wife or falling in love with her." I watch storm clouds roll across his face. "The love I have for you ... is very similar to the way you love Derek. I would probably die for you because you brought me back to life again and again and I won't forget that. The love I have for you didn't stop me from wanting Erica and that's not fair to you ... anymore than you loving Addison was fair to Derek. And how you felt then ... that's how I feel now. I never wanted to hurt you."

"But ... you did. You made me become Derek. Now I know how he felt."

"For what it's worth ... now I know how George felt when he was trying to stay with me and deal with wanting Stevens." I meet his eyes and hold them. "And I've realized that all the self doubt I felt after that and all the blame I put on myself ... I shouldn't have. There was nothing wrong with me. I tried my best to be what George needed and you tried your best to be what I needed, but at the end of the day ... it wasn't about you ... it was about me. You're the most amazing man I've ever known."

He digests that slowly.

So do I.

He finally leans forward, his elbows on his knees. "I don't forgive you for this and I'm not going to lay off her any time soon ... but ..."

The house phone rings. I pick up and listen to Cristina's tirade about losing her pager and missing a chance to scrub in with Webber. At her command, I go check the bedroom and the bathroom to see if she has left it at home, but it's not there. When I hang up and go back to the living room, Mark's gone. The weight of being alone settles on me like a hot blanket and I go to the kitchen and run water on my face. When I turn around to grab a towel ... I notice that the box Mark brought me has been moved.

I peer inside it.

The photo of us in our four poses is gone.

The weight of carrying someone's pain? Bone crushing.

I'm two hours late for dinner at Erica's. I've stopped looking at the ceiling which feels like amazing progress to me. Now I'm curled on my side, staring at my phone, and willing it to ring. Damn her willpower all to hell and back. She should have been on the phone with me the second I was late, demanding to know where I was. But it's silent. Her ring tone, because I'm pathetic and anal and morbidly transparent, is 'Bleeding Love' by Leona Lewis. It's the part of the song that I paid attention to in Miami. 'My heart is crippled by the vein that I keep on closing ... you cut me open and I keep bleeding love'. Whoever wrote that song must have known an Erica. I wonder if the songwriter bled the fuck out before they could be helped.

I'm doing that pathetic movie theater dialing, where I listen to movie times to make sure my phone is working and I'm not alone in the world, when someone knocks. Mark probably wants to give me back the picture in pieces. I'm still in my robe and my hair, which I washed earlier, has dried in fluffy waves that needed to be gelled right out of the shower, but I didn't care. There's no one to see me.

Two things go through my head at once when I see Erica standing on the other side of the door. 'Oh shit' and 'Damn, she even looks good in faded jeans and a lime green t-shirt.'

I notice that her eyes are puffy and she has on no makeup but before I can invite her in, she says, "I don't blame you for not coming. The things I said and did to you today - would you believe me if I said I'm sorry?"

"Are you?"

She bites her bottom lip and nods at me. Her chin is about to tremble and I stare at it until it does. She's a pretty crier. I have a tendency to get red and splotchy and I swear my nose doubles in size, but when she does it ... she stays pretty. Mark was wrong. She's not ugly in the slightest. I pull the door all the way open and she walks past me. She doesn't sit on the chair the way Mark did. She sits on the sofa and I sit down a few inches away. This? It isn't comfortable in the least. It feels like too tight pants that you're ashamed to wear because they push a fat roll up ... so you spend the whole day with your arms folded over your waist to hide it. Like you're ashamed to be less than perfect.

I want to wear her like a second skin instead of this horrible day and everything that happened.

"I don't know what's wrong with me, Callie. Hurting you ... that's the last thing I want to do."

I want to say something, anything. I open my mouth twice, but no sound comes out. I'm gearing up to ask her what she had for dinner because that's safe ... when she leans down and puts her head in my lap. One of her arms wraps around the front of my legs and she clutches at me. When she sobs ... I rest my hand on her curls and smooth them away from her face like my mother does with me. She's not pretty now. Pain makes a person contort their face and she's just like everyone else as she cries in a harsh, out loud kind of way that reminds me of the Quiet Room at the hospital. That room knows pain, it echoes it. She knows that she killed me a little in that hotel room and she's mourning the loss now. I look at the ceiling again as I rub her head, then her back. I was wrong ... that ceiling can and does crash down on me and when it does ... I cry with her. I'm quieter, probably uglier, but I still do it. This is how you cry when the traffic accident has been cleared and you're happy to be alive, but you don't know how you'll get home now.

We don't know how to reach one another now that we can. We're stuck being reminded of what COULD have been and that what we exchanged today doesn't measure up. What happened today ... rotted us both. What happened today ... hurt me, but maybe it obliterated her. It takes me a moment to realize that there are apologies mixed into her chest heaving sobs. I know she means it. You don't lie when you're being ravaged to death by guilt. I lean down and kiss her head, then rest my cheek against her hair . "It's okay. I'm sorry, too."

When I put my hand on her waist ... she slowly sits up and wipes her face. "I didn't mean to-"

"I know."

"And I don't think that you -"

"Shut up, Yellow.." I reach out and pull a curl off her cheek. It's wet and matted together with her tears. She leaked through my robe. It breaks my heart to see Erica Hahn, Miss In Control and Hard as Stone, fall apart. "I'm gonna kiss you in a few seconds and it's gonna be so good that you're gonna forget everything that happened today."

She wipes her face again and I can see a smile tug at the corner of her mouth. "You are a little cocky and far too sure of yourself, Torres."

I lean a little closer to her and I watch her eyes move to my mouth in anticipation. "You are a little soft and far too unsure of yourself, Hahn."

I don't let her reply. I tug her hair and pull her forward. This kiss ... this one isn't tentative at all. I won't let it be. It's not rushed or timid or anything except right. I feel her hands move to my face and it reminds me that she likes to hold onto me, she likes to hold me in her hands and when she does it I feel safe and secure in all that I am. I feel secure in my decision to be with her, content with my sexuality, and more confident than I ever have in my life. She makes me beautiful. She makes me feel like I can do anything, be anything, and accomplish anything. When her tongue touches mine ... I feel it all the way to the soles of my feet and I moan against it, changing the angle of my head and pulling her closer. We don't break apart as she slips one leg over my thighs and I settle my hands on her hips as she straddles me. I can't leave them there ... they inch under the back of her shirt and she's soft, unspeakably soft ... I wasn't wrong about that.

"I DON'T SEE A THING! NOTHING!"

We break apart and watch in horror as Cristina puts a hand over her eyes to shield us from her view as she stumbles toward her bedroom. We're still sitting there like stunned idiots while we listen to her rifle through her things and then she reappears, still not looking. "Found my pager! Not like it'll do much good. Dead battery."

"Cristina -" I begin.

She lowers her hand and looks from me to Erica. "Am I supposed to keep this a secret?"

Erica and I exchange a look. It passes unspoken between us that we're not ready for everyone to know. This is ours for now. Only ours. And ... apparently Cristina's. And Mark's. And Addison's. Because they all know it, too.

"It would be nice if you keep it to yourself," I reply. "We have enough to deal with right now and -"

"I'll be scrubbing in with Dr. Hahn tomorrow, then." Cristina crosses her arms over her chest and looks at Erica. "And you will teach me every time you get the chance. Uh ... Dr. Hahn, ma'am."

"You little SHIT!" Erica starts to stand up but I don't let her. "Blackmailing and -"

"Is it a deal?" Cristina asks quietly.

"FINE!" Erica snaps. "But we'll eventually tell and when that happens ... you're on your own, Yang!"

"Carry on." Cristina walks out the same way she walked in ... quickly and quietly.

I start to laugh and then Erica follows suit and the insanely hot moment we were enjoying unfortunately passes ... but so does the anger. This is us. We laugh and have fun and we can talk about anything. We can even weather any storm that may be coming because we've sailed through rough waters before and came out on the other side ... only not literally. We'll have to eventually 'come out' in the conventional, or unconventional depending on your view, sense. I don't want to do that yet, though. I want to be her secret and for her to be mine until we've loved away the chains that have kept us in bonds for so long. Then ... when we're stronger and we're not haunted ... and we're not still a little broken from falling so many times over our good intentions ... then ... I'll take her hand in the hallway. I'll coax her into an on call room ... and everyone will know. I won't care.

My stomach rumbles and I realize that I haven't eaten all day. "That was -"

"Are you hungry?" She looks down at my gurgling belly and puts her hands on her hips. God ... she's cute. "Did you not eat today?"

"Not yet."

Erica stands up ... and smacks my hand away when I try to pull her back to me. "What do you have in the kitchen?"

"Beer and ... beer."

"Jesus." I watch her walk across the room and open and close cabinets. I wasn't lying to her. There's plenty of beer and what didn't fit in the fridge is stored in the cabinet with the liquor. We have more beer than Joe's bar and when she looks at me again, she sighs. "Great. The woman I love is a lush and I have an alcoholic resident scrubbing in with me in the morning."

"I know the number for pizza by heart. Jalapeño peppers, sausage, and black olives. Oh, and hot wings. Fiery hot. Sound good?"

"No wonder you had a stomach ulcer." She joins me on the couch again, facing me, her thigh against mine. "I ate already. Alone, remember?"

"What did you cook?"

"Spaghetti."

"Now that would have hit the spot."

"Order your pizza ... and I'll hit the spot while you wait for it."

Shit ... she's good. She's is SOOO fucking good at jarring me senseless. I screw the number up twice before I get through and then I can't remember my credit card number so she hands me hers ... and then ... then I hang up and nearly swallow my tongue when she pulls her shirt over her head. I'm not the only perky one ... and she doesn't have a bra on. I was too freaked out in the motel room to appreciate her body and when she walks to the stereo and flips it on ... I don't know if she wants to relax me or drown out the noises she knows I will make for her. She tunes it to some easy listening shit and I make a mental note to loan her my iPod so that she can better understand what real music is ... and then I don't do anything mental at all ... because she finds a rhythm in the music that I didn't pick up on and she sways her hips a little as she unbuttons her jeans. My mouth is suddenly too dry and I'm lightheaded from her and not lack of food when she kicks off her shoes and slides the denim over her legs. You wouldn't peg Erica Hahn for the lacy panty type ... she looks like a cotton kind of girl, simple and plain ... possibly with white being the raciest color ... but she's wearing royal blue lace panties that are see through.

Blue may be my favorite color right now.

I watch her hips move in a circle for a second longer ... then she slides her hands over those panties and upward ... cupping her breasts as she continues to sway. I don't think that Sarah McLachlan ever intended her music to be interpreted this way.

Erica turns her back to me and I watch with wide eyes as her head falls back and her curtain of blond hair nearly touches the top of her panties. OMFG, nearly a thong.

Into this night I wander

It's morning that I dread

Another day of knowing of

The path I fear to tread

Oh into the sea of waking dreams

I follow without pride

Nothing stands between us here

And I won't be denied

Oh. My. God.

Could there be a more fitting song?

We're going forward with this ... not showing any gay pride yet because we're secrets for now ... but we're GOING forward.

Jesus H. Christ ... and she's going to take her panties off RIGHT NOW.

And I would be the one

To hold you down

Kiss you so hard

I'll take your breath away

And after I

Wipe away the tears

Just close your eyes dear

It takes the ENTIRE CHORUS for her to pull them down and by then I'm on my feet. I catch them when she throws them my way and then she's coming toward me and I'm so fucking glad that I only have on a robe and my panties that I could die. I pull the belt and swear because now I've knotted it and it's going to take me ten minutes to work it out ... then she's kissing me and I feel her hands manipulating the knot and her foot sliding up my leg. I am supposed to be the sexy one, okay? It's what I do. I take control, I'm in charge, and I'm sexy as HELL and I know it ... but she makes me fumble all over the place. She makes me tremble and forget to breathe and roll over like a good dog with just one look at me.

She has the knot under control in under five seconds and my robe falls around our feet.

Touching her cuts both ways. I ache when I do and I ache when I don't.

When she touches me ... I don't ache ... I burn.

We kiss our way through something by Elton John and she urges me backward until I feel the couch behind my legs. I start to sit down, but she stops me and sits down first. I watch her lie back against the comforter I used the night before and motion for me. Instead of falling onto her like I'm frantic (which, okay, I am) ... I touch her knee and just as slowly as she undressed, I walk my fingers up her inner thigh until I touch her center. I hear her say my name, but I ignore her and slide my fingers against her. She parts her legs and her hips slowly move upward while I lick my lips and watch her unfold. I want to make her squirm and when she starts to do just that ... I feel triumphant.

"Callie ..."

"Hmmm?"

She tells me exactly what she wants in vivid and shocking detail. I never pegged her for a phone sex operator, but something tells me she could have done that in the past. Her voice gets a little deeper and she punctuates each dirty, dirty thought with her finger gently popping the hem of my panties. Vixen. She knows exactly what she's doing to me and I hesitate over jumping to do her bidding simply because I can and not because I have any intention of not doing what she so eloquently demanded. It's basically the most pornographic one sided conversation I've ever had and if she doesn't do every last thing she implied ... I'll ... well ... be glad for anything she does do. Because I'm that bad off.

I shed my panties and ease one leg over her head, straddling her face the same way she straddled my legs. When she lifts her mouth against me ... I lower mine against her. For the record ... sixty-nine has never been my favorite position until right now. I wrap one arm under her thigh and slide a finger into her while my tongue remembers every spot that makes her gasp with pleasure. I didn't forget. I didn't forget one thing. And ohmygodsheisdoingthatthingwhereshehums ... neither did she. Sensory overload makes me forget my name, but I know exactly how to touch her. I know where to put pressure, where to ease up, which side of clit is the most sensitive and that she likes to feel my teeth against it. When I do that ... I feel her fingernails dig into my thighs and she fastens her lips around the tight bud at the center of my nervous system.

I do the same thing.

She comes fast, her hands squeezing my ass as she lets her mouth fall away from me, and cries out. I'm so close to being there myself that I resort to begging, but she rides out her release without touching me. Considering the noises that she makes ... I can't hold it against her. I eventually want to tell her to finish what she started right fucking now, but I do what she eventually says and get to my feet to swap places with her. When I'm flat on my back, she kneels beside the sofa and I reach up to touch the red streaks on her chest where her body flushed with pleasure. She doesn't turn very red when she cries ... but when she comes ... her body is an inferno. I want to kiss every fucking inch of that redness until it does it again and again. I push myself onto my elbows and try to do just that, but she kisses me instead. I can taste her ... and me ... and the fire that has been scorching both of us for so long that we became mostly ash, mostly scattered ... mostly gone ... goes away.

She moves her hand between my thighs while our tongues are dueling and I open for her. When she eases two fingers into me and barely moves them ... I know what she's doing. She's erasing what she did to me at the Seattle Skyline Inn. She's doing it right this time and I'm so wet and ready that I pull away from her kiss and fall back against the sofa as all of it builds inside me ... her, me ... us ... it's all there. Her thumb moves against me, not urgent, but persistent and when I start to vocalize that ... she whispers, "Look at me."

I do ... her blue eyes lock on my brown ones and with her empty hand, she brushes back my hair and lowers her head. With her face just inches from mine, her breathing increases. That's how you know you're with a good lover ... when they feel you start to come and hyperventilate with you ... it's all good from there. "Let me hear it, Callie. Let it go."

I grab onto her arm and do exactly that. The sound I make as my body shatters and the shards race through my veins is louder than the radio. I think it was supposed to be her name, but only the 'Ahhhhhhhhh' part at the end of it actually comes out. I shudder hard and the relief is so fucking BIG that I can't move a muscle except to convulse and spasm and shiver with it. Never ... in all my life ... not since I figured out what my body could do or how many times I made it do it myself ... has an orgasm felt like that. I don't know whether to laugh or cry or ... possibly faint. I'm definitely dizzy enough to faint and when she sucks one of my turgid nipples into her mouth and I feel her tongue flick against it ... I do it again! I get off without her even trying to push that hard. I hear her chuckle and watch her smirk with smug satisfaction as she leans down and kisses the scar that she gave me. It's about eight inches long and starts just below my ribcage, pointing straight downward toward my crotch. As her tongue trails over it ... she shifts the hand between my legs and moves her fingers a little deeper.

She's gonna kill me.

When my fourth orgasm rockets through me a little while later (but who's counting!?), there's a knock at the door and Erica slips her hand from me. I protest, but not much because I'm too weak to do more than mewl like a kitten. Not even the smell of pizza can pull me together and I don't make a sound until she kisses me and then I pull her down on top of me. With my arms around her waist ... I say, "It's worth it."

"What is?"

"Anything that went wrong in the past ... anything else that happens ... it's worth it for this right here."

I mean every word of it.

She winds up staying all night and we make a pallet in the floor because the only way we fit on the sofa is on top of one another and I don't mind that ... but she doesn't think we'll get much rest. She sets her clock early and when it goes off, I wake up to watch her fumble for it. She sets snooze and looks like she's gonna do just that until she notices that I'm awake. When it goes off again ... we pull apart with a groan and she says, "I've got surgery, baby. I should go."

Baby.

That's what the OTHER WOMAN called her.

"Don't call me that."

She pushes herself on her elbow and looks down at me. "Oooh, someone's cranky in the morning."

Just like that ... my good, happy, sated mood is GONE. Morning has sucked it dry. "Did you break up with her yet?"

I watch Erica's eyebrows shoot upward. "Well, I haven't talked to her ... I mean ... I was expecting you last night so I didn't -"

"You haven't told her yet!?"

"I just said I haven't talked to her."

"Great! Really fucking great! You made me the other woman and -"

"Whoa!" She puts a hand on my stomach. "It's not like that with her. She's not -"

"Just ... go to work."

Erica slings a leg over mine when I start to sit up. "Nuh uh, we're not doing this. Not today."

"What's today?" I snap.

"New beginnings. And I don't have to tell her anything, Callie, because I already told her weeks ago exactly where she stood."

"Tell her anyway."

"Will that make you feel better?"

"Tying a cement block to her ankles and dropping her in the bay would not even make me feel better."

"Daaaaamn. I didn't peg you for the jealous type."

"I didn't peg you for the -"

"Don't say it." Erica puts her finger over my lips and shakes her head. "You want to meet me for lunch later? You need to go in and talk to Richard. If he knows that I'm lying about giving you samples of Ambien he isn't letting on and by the way ... we need to talk about that."

"Or ... not."

"Where did you get it?"

"It belonged to Burke."

She swears under her breath. "That man ... not only does he cost me every influential award and write up ... he's careless with his drugs."

"That's a huge stretch and you know it."

"Yeah, but it's not like I need another reason to hate him." She kisses me, lingering over it like it's a chore to pull away. "Mind if I use the shower?"

"Mind if I join you?"

"You're gonna make me late, huh?"

"Probably."

I do make her late. I make her leave a half hour past the time she was supposed to scrub in. She bitches on her way out the door that she's going to be starving by lunchtime and says that I suck for not even having a bagel, but I flash my boobs at her and she stops talking. Even though she has one foot out the door ... she comes back and kisses me one more time. With her mouth against mine, she says, "I love you."

"I love you back."

She gropes my boob. "I love your front."

"Go, pervert!"

When she goes, I flop down on our pallet and bury my face in her pillow. I'm smiling so much it hurts.

I spent weeks telling myself that I'd never find the kind of happiness I feel in her arms with anyone else and I was not wrong. I come to life with her. I'm aware of everything and nothing when she pulls me against her shoulder and I sleep better there than I have ever slept before. She's not large or overpowering. She doesn't have broad shoulders or muscles that ripple in her back, but I feel like she could fight my demons off with one hand and still be able to hang onto me with the other.

Her ability to be so strong will come in handy. I just don't know it yet.

Erica saved me once on the operating table. She charged the paddles again and again until my heart was too scared of her to not beat. Maybe that's why it answers to her so easily and leads me to hers without hesitation.

Happiness is the most fleeting feeling in the world and when people figure out that you're happy ... they work together like a colony of ants to tear you down. It won't be any different for me. For us.

But while her pillow still smells like lilacs and my skin is still tingling from her touch ... I don't entertain the thought of what could happen ... I'm thinking about what has happened. I'm off the hanger, but not quite out of the closet and I've got company for a change.

For a while ... that will be enough.


	9. Chapter 9

Relationships are not my strongest suit.

They're just ... not.

Before I met George ... I plowed through men like a steamroller and the one or two that were decent enough to hang onto for more than a couple of dates wound up running the second they found out I had money. For the record ... money isn't that amazing. Case in point, I could spend ten thousand dollars on something to give Erica and the check would clear, but I choose to spend thirty bucks on a new scrub cap instead. The one she wears has polka dots and it's not remotely cute. She's not the polka dot kind and even though she wears it well ... I want her to wear me. The cap has a beach theme. And seashells. It's a little bit busy and a whole lot cheerful and I know that she'll get it the second she sees it. The beach is our thing. I didn't set out for it to become our thing, but that's what it is. I taught her the ins and outs of the ocean and she taught me that it's perfectly fine to love her and be myself by doing it.

When I arrive at the hospital for lunch, I stop by the attending's lounge to hang the cap in her locker. I love that I know the combination to the lock the same way I know her. I quickly open it and hang the cap on the hook. She'll know it's from me and hopefully it will make her smile. Her locker is obscenely neat and orderly. If you open mine ... you may get a severed foot from so much dropping out of it. There are two shelves inside hers. Her battered purse sits on the bottom one while her briefcase is wedged onto the top one. Next to her purse ... is a bottle of lotion and I pick it up, twisting the lid. There it is ... lilacs. I commit the manufacturer to memory so that I can buy stock in it.

I quickly slam the door when someone comes into the room. It's Derek and he stops walking, looks from me to Erica's locker, then shakes his head a little. I'm pretty sure that I can add him to the list of people who know the truth about what happened with Mark. He has a great stare and I start to feel like I'm under a microscope so I leave before he can say anything. I need to keep my head relatively clear for the meeting with Webber that may or may not end my career. In the hallway there are whispers and I don't know if it's because of everything that happened with Mark or if it's the fact that I clean up very, very well. Webber reminds me of my Dad so I pulled a dress out for the occasion. I'm hoping that it'll work wonders on the Chief, too. It's feminine, but not girlish. It definitely states that I am woman through and through, but it's also white and if I'm going to be burned at the stake for clipping an artery and causing a death ... I should look as virginal as possible.

Chief Webber is waiting with his door open and he looks up over his glasses when I knock. He smiles at me, gets to his feet and I see his eyes move over me. This is one of those moments where you don't know whether to hug someone or shake their hand. He solves the dilemma by giving me a one armed squeeze, then scooting the chair in front of his desk back and handing me into it. I listen as he shuts the door and have a small panic attack fearing that he showed me affection to soften the blow of firing me, but when he smiles after he sits down ... I breathe easier.

"How are you, Dr. Torres?"

"I'm good."

"I heard you had a nice time in Miami."

How the hell did he know that? "Uh, yes ... sir."

"Addison. We talk a lot." He clears his throat and reaches for a file and I find myself waiting for a pink slip. "We were able to get John Cooper's family to settle out of court and protect our reputation in the process. The fact that you had Ambien in your system never saw the light of day. I've scheduled you for a hip replacement Monday and a rotator cuff on Tuesday. As a personal favor to me ... you'll also stay on Dr. Simmons good side and stop making me get daily complaints about your attitude."

Whoosh. That's what I sound like ... an uncorked bottle with a genie inside who can finally be free. I'm going to make Dr. Simmons regret the day he took over as Head of Orthopedics. Oh ... yes I am. "Absolutely."

Richard extends a hand. "Welcome back."

"Thank you."

"And the next time Dr. Hahn lies to me for you ... I'm writing you both up." He sees me fumble for a quick excuse and chuckles, still shaking my hand. "Have a good day, Dr. Torres."

As far as dismissals go ... that one is pretty tame. I get to my feet, wish him well, and head out into the hallway. When I shut his door behind me I have to lean against it as my brain starts to process it all. The Cooper family settled out of court. They got money for their son's life and I didn't even get a stiff warning. Losing a patient ... any patient ... is horrible, but when it's a kid ... you feel it to the core. I used to be able to count the lives I had lost on one hand. Now I have to use two. John was the sixth one. I've assisted on more than that who have died ... but I've lost six now on my own. Three of those had adverse reactions to anesthesia. One died after the fact, when infection took over. One died from cardiac arrest. And John Cooper died because I clipped his artery. That's on me. That's on MY hands.

I have a while before lunch so I go into the chapel and light a candle for him. This is the worst part about being a doctor. It's not the puke on your clothes or the oozing, smelly wounds ... it's knowing that when the bases are loaded ... you can save or lose. It's remembering the hour, minute, and second that you called a life as being done. I didn't call Johnny ... but I caused it. I think that's worse.

I was wrong in believing that nothing could impact my happiness today.

I should have been punished.

My phone vibrates as I sit down on a pew and I have to smile when I see that it's Addison. "You're interrupting my time with God. This better be good."

"Well, pray for me, too. You owe me. I pretty much sold my soul to Richard to make sure you wouldn't even get a slap on the wrist. Say you love me, freak."

"I love you, freak. I miss you more, though. I hope you get sand in your crack from the beach. And thank you for selling your soul. I wonder if Webber knows that it's slightly demented."

"I prefer 'slighty distracted'. Was Richard mean to you?"

"Not at all. What did you do?"

"I'll never tellll."

"If it involves naked video calls and you dancing ... thank you for not telling me."

"CALLIOPE! You need to talk to God really, really hard for that."

"I'm trying. Hang on." I light another candle and say a quick prayer before I head toward the breezeway, where I lean my elbows against the rail and watch storm clouds move into the city. "So, what's new? Broken any shower heads lately?"

"I shouldn't have told you that," she replies. "And no I have not. What about you? Been gay lately?"

"Bite me."

"Nah."

"You would."

She laughs. "Would not."

"How's the weather in California?"

"Nice attempt at changing the subject, Ellen. I'm not talking about the weather with you. I'm talking about you. How's Erica?"

"Wonderful."

"Sapphically wonderful?"

"Stop living vicariously through my sex life."

"So there is a sex life?"

"Quit it!"

"Come on! Tell me! I did go all the way to Miami to console you and -"

"Almost got me arrested."

"There is that."

I laugh. I feel about a million pounds lighter. "So, what are you up to?"

"Well, I'm currently sitting in a gallery watching a very skilled cardiothoracic surgeon perform surgery. She's impressive, Callie. I can see why you like her."

"You're here!?"

"I am."

"OH MY GOD!"

Even if I sprouted wings ... I couldn't get to the gallery fast enough. I don't run, but I do a strange power walk while I hurry to the gallery. When I climb the stairs and open the door, Addison stands up and smiles at me, opening her arms. "Told you I sold my soul," she says, squeezing me tight. "I'm baaaack. And damn, you look good. Is that an Azria dress?"

"Hell if I know."

"I like it."

"You're back?"

"I pretty much decided to come back while I was here last time. You don't know how much you miss something until you see it again." Reaching over, she puts her hand on mine. "I had an agenda when I went to Miami. I wanted to make up my mind once and for all about California. And with your help ... I did. I love working with Naomi and Sam, but it's not like here and I'd rather have the drama of this place ... than the one patient a day monotony and sunshine of California. I mean ... I miss you. I miss Mark. I miss Derek and God help me ... I even miss Meredith Grey!"

Someone behind us swears suddenly and I look down at the surgery in progress.

Erica is charging paddles and I cringe as I watch her attempt to resuscitate her patient to no avail.

It hits her hard and when she throws the paddles across the room and snatches her scrub cap off ... I feel her pain.

"Damn," Addison says. "That sucks."

I give Erica a sad smile when she glances up at me, but she looks away before I can mouth that I'm sorry. "I'm gonna go see if -"

"Go. I'm having lunch with Richard to officially accept my old position back." She nods down at the OR. "Does anyone know about -"

"No! And we're keeping it that way, Addy. Got it?"

"Got it." She winks at me and I squeeze her hand before I leave her.

Erica is not in the scrub room. I check the women's bathroom, then the stairwell, and finally head to the attending's locker room again. I find her sitting on the bench in front of the lockers with her head in her hands. Her polka dotted cap is dangling from her fingertips and when I sit down beside her I can see that her face is just as red as it is when she gets off. She's not crying, but the look on her face is one that I know very well. She has to go and tell a family that .. despite her efforts ... she couldn't beat back death. This is the part where you tell yourself to disconnect because if you walk into the waiting room and tell someone that their loved one has died and you are NOT disconnected ... you will shatter with them. Doctors are not without feeling, but we have to shut it down, close our mind, dig deep and articulate loss with careful precision. Sometimes ... the cuts you give someone in the waiting room are deeper than the ones you give with your scalpel.

I don't ask if she's okay. I already know that she's on the freeway and she's about twenty miles past the exit marked okay. "Can I do anything?"

"What is she doing here?"

"Who?"

"Addison." Erica glances my way and then back down at her cap. She worries the frayed edges between her fingertips and I want to reach out and stop her, but I don't. It's so fantastically ridiculous that I can hold Addison's hand in a gallery full of people, but I can't touch Erica in an empty locker room when she needs me to. "You're even dressing like her. Are you trying to take the lipstick lesbian thing to extremes?"

What do you say to that? Right. "Ouch."

"Look, I just spent the morning letting Yang do most of my surgery and listening to her talk about the way that Burke operates and how Burke has a technique that is far superior to mine. Burke was featured in JAMA and Burke has the Harper Avery and Burke is the best damn heart surgeon in Seattle Grace history. I had to bite my tongue and I'm not used to that because I keep my personal life and my professional life very separate and now it's not and she's abusing that." She rubs a hand over her face and I suddenly feel very guilty for waking her up at three a.m. to go another round with her. I feel guilty that I'm not brave enough to let everyone know that I'm in love with her so that Cristina has no leverage. Before I can say anything, she continues. "I'm sorry. It's not a good day. You look very pretty, by the way."

"Are you a little bit bipolar? Maybe?"

She laughs. "Lately? Yes."

"You know what?" I nudge her with my shoulder. "Burke may have the Harper Avery and he may be in JAMA, but you know what he doesn't have?"

"Gross emotional problems?"

"Uhhh ... he dated Cristina." I raise a brow playfully. "What he doesn't have, smart ass, is the here and now. You own it. It's yours. And your technique is flawless. I happen to be a fan."

"Only you can make a pep talk dirty."

"Complaining?"

The door opens behind us and I pretend that I'm engrossed in the strap of my high heel. I hear a locker open and shut behind me and then I clear my throat when the coast is clear. Erica holds up her cap, pointing at a torn spot. "I thought this thing would make me lucky, but that man in there-"

"Make your own luck."

She gets to her feet and twists the dial on her lock. I know the numbers by heart and as I watch her fingers move back and forth, I see it in my head. It's my birthday. She opens the door and starts to hang her cap on the hook, but something is already there. She puts the old one on the shelf next to her purse instead and takes the new one down. I watch her trace a seashell with her thumb and I know that I chose wisely when she smiles. "Callie -"

Someone bustles into the room behind me and I grit my teeth.

She takes her phone out and types something.

My phone is silent but I feel it vibrate in my purse and pull it out.

The text is from her. 'I couldn't love you more if I tried. You really are the most amazing woman I've ever known. Are you mad at me?'

'Not really. You will be groveling later for the lipstick lesbian comment, but for what it's worth I'm going to get over it really, really fast.'

'Not too fast. I should grovel really, really slow to make sure you know how much I mean it.'

'We'll see how slow you are when you find out that my panties are crotchless.'

The phone drops out of her hand and I fight hard not to laugh as Dr. Savoy, the blond asshole who harassed Bailey during the Duquette M&M, glances at her. She picks the Blackberry up and I swear to God she tries to look up my skirt. And I swear to God ... I kinda let her. She ties her shoes twice without looking at them and when Savoy FINALLY leaves, she touches my knee. "Are you trying to kill me?"

"Not before you grovel."

"Come to my place tonight. I'll order a pizza for you. I'll even ... eat it."

"Yeah," I reply. "You will."

The phone drops from her hand again and she shoots me another look.

I get to my feet when she slips the new cap onto her head. She tucks stray hair under it and stares in the mirror, but she's not looking at it. She's not seeing how the blue in it matches her eyes or how the seashells have the same color as her skin. She's looking at me. I reach up and touch the curls at the nape of her neck and tie it for her, then I rest my chin on her shoulder. "You still want to have lunch?"

"I wish I could, but I have another surgery in about twenty minutes. I have to ... go break the news to the family that's waiting on me."

"It'll be okay. Call me later if it's not." I breathe against her ear. "I get to come back Monday. Webber let me off the hook."

She turns suddenly and her face falls. "I am so sorry ... I didn't even ask! How did it go? Are you okay? What's going to -"

"Shhh." I put my finger against her lips, the same way she did to me that morning. "Everything's perfect. I'll see you at seven?"

"If you stand me up again -"

"Then I will grovel."

There's a commotion outside the door and we jump apart again before I can kiss her. I'm a coward. It would be so easy to just grab the hospital .phone, press the intercom button, and announce that I'm in love with her. Or, you know, I could tell Joe and that would cause it to spread through Seattle Grace faster than any announcement I could make. I pick up my purse and dig around until I find my keys as two attendings that I've seen in passing come in. They look at me like I'm a lowly resident who is invading their space and I am tempted to moon both of them, but I fight the urge and nod at Erica. "Dr. Hahn, it's been a pleasure."

"Likewise, Dr. Torres. The ... information was incredibly useful. I'm very grateful for your ... generosity."

I glance up at her cap. It's at home on her head and I think it's full of a lot more than luck. I'm gonna be with her when she breaks the news to the family that is waiting for word and I'll be with her in her next surgery, too. I'd like to think that love is better than luck because love is guaranteed. "You're very welcome. Any time that I can ... help ... let me know."

When I get into the hallway ... people are looking at me again, but they're not whispering. I think it's because they see that my back is straight, my shoulders are squared, and nothing they say can erase the smile on my face. My heels click with a renewed sense of purpose and for the first time in my life ... I can see past tomorrow. I stopped imagining the future after Jasper went away. I didn't let myself face the fact that he wanted to be a fireman, an astronaut, a guitarist in a famous band, or a skateboarder. I didn't let myself think about the fact that his dreams were drowned out of him, but were still alive in me. Every year that passes and I see him grow into his body ... I tell myself that he doesn't know that he's not ... anything he wanted to be. I watch him live in the shadow of his mind, but never unravel the mess that boats and water and crashes left him with.

I've unraveled my mind.

If it's possible to live enough for two people ... then that's what I'm doing for me and for Jazz.

Because he loves Yellow, too.

Before I started this thing with Erica, music really was background noise and I'd wrinkle my nose at anything that didn't have a loud guitar or overzealous drummer. I like Hip Hop because it's easy to dance to, Rock makes you feel less angry (or possibly more depending), and the few female singers that I enjoy are Alanis Morrisette-like in their lyrical attitude. Because of falling so hard for someone ... I now have Sarah McLachlan's entire collection and as I drive down the street Erica lives on for dinner, I actually find the song that she danced to. I have to tighten my hands on the steering wheel and nearly take out her neighbor's mailbox. I have to come to a complete stop before I turn in the driveway because the pizza delivery guy is on his way out. He throws up a friendly hand and I wave back. She didn't ask me what kind of pizza I wanted ... for some reason that makes me smile. I wouldn't have to ask what kind of wine she wants. I just know.

Just like I know, as I make the turn onto her wooded drive, that my period has arrived.

I've had minor cramps all day.

And I've been looking forward to being with her again since I woke up.

God has a very warped sense of humor.

Luckily, I've retired the white dress and opted for jeans and a nice shirt. When she opens the door, I give her a kiss and make small talk for ten seconds before I point down the hall and tell her I'll be right back. Sure enough ... I've started. It's not horrible yet, but for some reason it's more embarrassing to ask her for a tampon than it was to call Mark and tell him to buy a whole box. She chuckles when she returns with one and she also brings me a couple of Tylenol and a cup of water. See? This is why she rocks. I take care of business and wash my hands, then freeze. Something is breathing hard right outside the door. Buddha growls, then scratches, then I see his nose under the door as he sniffs loudly. When I open it, he spins on the spot then dances on his back legs while he waits for me to pick him up.

"Hi, puppy!" I bend down and he leaps into my arms, trying to lick my face. He whines and shivers and claws at my shirt as I hug him. "I missed you too."

"That damn dog." Erica comes down the hallway and sneers at the fuzzy bundle of fur in my arms. "He would walk twenty miles out of the way to keep me from touching him. And he'd walk through hot coals for the chance to bite me."

I laugh when the damn dog in question plants a wet kiss on my chin. "I think you're exaggerating."

She shoots me a look and reaches out to touch Buddha. He goes from cuddly to Cujo in less than a second. He lunges at her and wriggles so much that I have to put him down. She lifts her foot before he can bite it and he settles for latching onto her pants and shaking his head back and forth. She snaps his name and he drops off her and rushes to the bedroom.

"Don't yell at him." I cross my arms over my chest. "You're mean to him."

"I am mean to him? Have you seen my ankles? I look like a cutter." She holds out her hand. "You hungry?"

"Starved."

In the living room, she shows me two movies: Spiderman 1 & 2. It's going to be a good night after all. I flop onto the sofa beside her and she opens the pizza box. One half of the pie is smothered in jalapeños, sausage, and black olives ... and I only ever told her once that it was my favorite. Her half is covered with every vegetable imaginable as if that could could make it more than a nutritional wasteland.

We chatter our way through my first slice and before I can pick up my second ... I start to wonder about her, the nameless girl who keeps preventing me from being as happy as I should be. Did she sit where I'm sitting? Did she watch movies and laugh at everything Erica said the way I do? I don't bother with the second piece. I want to ask if she's out of the picture all the way. I want to ask what Erica told her about me and about how serious they really were. Most of all ... I want to ask if making me feel this way was worth it, because it pisses me off and destroys me in equal measures. I shouldn't be thinking about it. I should be happy that I'm the one here and that I'm the one who belongs here ... but I can't be.

"You okay?" Erica asks.

"Cramps," I lie. Well, it's not really a lie. I do have cramps, but it's more or less my heart that is aching and not my ovaries.

I shouldn't be jealous. Not really. I know where I stand.

My eyes dance around the living room like I'm going to stumble onto something that she left behind. Everything still looks the same. The walls are still a soothing taupe and the fringe-edged throw pillows (the ones I once called ugly once and got a face full of) are tossed onto the loveseat. The first time I saw this room I was struck by how homey and lived in it is. There aren't that many personal effects in it, but the furniture is comfortable and the art is pretty and it's the kind of room you can kick your shoes off in and not worry about being told to keep your feet off the sofa. The house I grew up in is immaculate and everything is always new because my mother changes decor the way I change shoes. Everything changes before you can plant a memory there, but here ... you can plant something and it will take roots and grow. This isn't a house. It's a home.

And someone other than me got to kick their shoes off in it for a while.

"Callie?"

"I'll be right back."

I go to the bathroom again and shut the door. A moment later, Buddha scratches and I let him in. He's a yippy little bastard and as I sit down on the edge of the bathtub, he plants his paws on my chest and barks at me. He could be telling me, in his own way, that he didn't want her here either. He could be saying that he's glad to see me because Erica is happier and maybe she gives him dog treats when she's with me. Maybe.

The only thing worse than being haunted by someone you don't know ... is knowing that someone you don't know can haunt you at all.

Erica knocks on the door. "Are you okay?"

"Did you tell her yet?"

She wiggles the knob, but it's locked. "Open the door."

"Did you?"

"Yes, Callie, I told her." She sighs and I can imagine her leaning her head against the wall. "I've already made it very clear to you that she didn't matter. At all."

"You said she was amazing."

"I wanted to piss you off."

"You did."

"Are we going to talk through the door all night? Because I gotta tell you ... between this and texting ... I'm starting to feel disenchanted with our lines of communication."

"Did she spend the night here all the time?"

"No. Never."

Buddha still has his front paws on my chest and he's looking at me like he's trying to plead Erica's case. I scratch his ear and he leans into my hand. It strikes me that like his owner ... he's starved for affection. And like his owner ... he's looking to me for it. I suddenly have a horrible, sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. I tuck him under my arm and yank the door open. "Was she a hooker!?"

"What!? Oh my god! No!"

"Then who was she?"

"Can you please let this go?!"

"No, I can't."

Erica looks at me for a while before she speaks. "I treated her sister before I transferred to Seattle Grace. A few weeks after I operated on you, she called to tell me that her sister had died and when I went to the funeral ... well, we were both hurting. I told her upfront that I was in love with you and that all she was ... was a warm body. That's all she wanted, too. You nearly killed me, Cal, and I needed to remember that I was alive. It didn't mean anything to me." She reaches up and touches my hair while her eyes do that thing where they travel all over my face. "How could it when my heart was with you all along?"

I believe her.

I believe every syllable of it and I know that I'm just as guilty of doing the same thing with Mark ... only he didn't know it. At least she didn't use someone who wasn't aware. Buddha wiggles in my arms and I change his position, holding him against my heart. I lean down and rub my nose against his fur and he nips it, then grabs my earring and yanks it out. "Ow!"

"Devil dog," she replies, reaching for him. "I'll put him in his crate."

He attempts to crawl up my shirt to get away from her and he needs a good nail clipping. I feel like I've been attacked by a cat by the time I set him on the floor. He bites her ankle, causing her to jump and then he bites the other which makes her yell. When he vanishes around the corner and into the bedroom again ... she's cussing up a storm. I laugh at her until my sides ache and she starts to say something, but doesn't. She reaches into my hair, where the earring is tangled, then looks at my ear. I stop laughing when she rubs against the lobe, then leans forward and kisses it. She doesn't just kiss it ... she sucks it into her mouth and I hiss. "You have to stop that."

"Spend the night with me?"

"Uh ... you do remember that I got my period, right? And as you can see ... cramps make me cranky."

"Stay," she says, her hands on my hips. "As much as I want you ... I need you more."

Her lips on mine make up my mind for me. "Okay."

She kisses me again and I forget that there was ever anyone else here. When she rubs her noses against mine, she says, "I got you something today."

"You did?"

"Come here."

I follow her into her bedroom and draw up short. I've only been in there a couple of times and I'm stunned to see that the painting over her bed that a patient did for her is gone. In its place is a photo of the view from the balcony in Miami. She bought a disposable camera the day that we shopped for bathing suits, one of the panoramic kinds, and the size of the photo alone makes me think that she spent a fortune to develop it. I don't even know who she would pay to make it that big. It's almost like standing where she stood and seeing what she saw. I gasp when I realize that Jazz and I are silhouetted against the water. "Oh my god," I whisper, reaching out to touch my brother. "This is ... unbelievable."

"Oh, that," she says, smiling sheepishly. "I really did like that balcony. And ... you."

She points to her nightstand, where there's a photo of me resting on her nightstand. It's also from Florida and I remember the moment she snapped it. It was before we had sex and I was laughing at the fact that she didn't want to get on the jet ski with me.

In that moment ... I know that I hurt her more than she hurt me by moving on with that woman. I hurt her in a way that meant she would rather have reminders of me all over the place than be pissed enough to remove me from her life completely. That's the kind of hurt that doesn't ever go away completely. That's the kind of hurt that settles into your bones and makes you wonder if you can breathe again without aching.

I kiss her until we're both breathless and I have never wanted someone more in my life ... so much that I offer to do dirty things to her, but she tells me that if I can't, she can't. My heart feels like it's straining against my chest and when I step away and smile at her, she holds up a narrow box. It's covered in burgundy velvet and when I take it, I can tell that she's holding her breath. I thought that the photo over her bed was ... the something she had gotten for me.

"Open it before the suspense kills me!" she says. "I'm not good at this kind of thing."

"Okay, okay!"

The bracelet inside is beautiful.

The diamonds are white and canary yellow.

She's watching me when I gasp and look up at her. Wordlessly, she takes it from the box and fastens it around my wrist. "I was going to get you a ring, but I figure that since I'm already wound around your little finger so tight ... it would be hard to move."

"This ... oh my God. Erica, I love it." I trace one of the yellow diamonds with my fingertip. "It's you. Yellow."

She touches one of the regular diamonds. "And you. You're clear. I see everything clearly with you."

"Damn it. I bought you a scrub cap. I suck."

"That thing's priceless," she assures me with a kiss. "Now, why don't you show me Spiderman and if it's better than Daredevil ... I'll cook you French Toast in the morning."

I fall asleep with my head on her lap halfway through the movie. Her fingers raking through my hair works like a sleeping pill.

I don't have to make love with her to feel sated.

We spend the following day at Pike Place Market. We don't hold hands as we prowl through the shops and stop to watch people toss and catch fish. That makes me sad. Having dual identities like a superhero ... that's way overrated. I don't even get the snazzy costume and yet .. I have to hide in the Bat Cave. Well, Bat Closet. As we walk towards Starbucks, the back of my hand brushes hers and she moves away. To say that I hate it is putting is mildly. In the coffee shop, we sit down and she pulls out a map of the market and spreads it down on the table. She takes out a notepad and jots down a few things, telling me that she's cooking us something decent for dinner. I only half listen as I watch people come and go. I'm not rude, okay, but I care as much for food shopping as I care for Stevens.

People watching is interesting.

There are two men sitting near us and the way they look at one another makes me think that they're together. I keep glancing their way, watching the way that they lean toward one another with a little more familiarity than two friends would. They laugh, they keep eye contact, and they're not sitting across from one another. They're sitting next to each other and their knees are touching. Nothing else is. Most people wouldn't notice, but I do. Their knees can touch, but not their hands. I think maybe their hearts touch, too, because I can see it in the way they interact with each other.

A rowdy group of teenagers come in and wrestle their way into line. One of the boys, a walking American Eagle ad, snorts when his curly haired pal orders a Chai Latte. He mocks him, repeating the order like it's something dirty. Then the American Eagle ad nudges another friend and speaks in a loud voice. "Why doesn't he just advertise that he's a faggot with faggot taste? Chai Latte ... translation ... I'm a homo!"

Erica has stopped scribbling her grocery list.

The two men with touching knees are suddenly not smiling. They're still looking at one another, but the laughter is gone. I can see their silent apology as they exchange gazes ... like they're sorry, like it hurts to hide, and I don't even know if they realize that they each move their chairs apart a fraction of an inch. They would have to reach to touch now and neither of them looks like they want to exert the effort it would take to climb across a couple of words. They look tired. When I was growing up I heard labels all the time. I was the tallest in class by sixth grade and my black hair, braces, glasses, and size twelve designer jeans mattered a little too much. I heard that I was a 'half breed', that I was a 'mixed nut'. I heard that I was a 'fat Cuban' and an 'ugly nerd'. 'Rich bitch', 'Amazon woman', 'big Bertha', 'beached whale', 'illegal alien', 'lard ass', 'brace face', 'four eyes' and my full lips were compared to Mick Jagger's on more than one occasion. I heard it all. I lived it all.

I couldn't wait to become an adult and not live under the banner of any label except what I was going to become ... a doctor. A female bone surgeon who kicks ass, takes names, and doesn't worry about minor things like extra baggage around my middle.

I'm not defined by anything except ME.

What I refuse be now ... is a 'coward'.

I scrape my chair back with enough force to make noise. Several heads turn my way, specifically the American Eagle asshole, and when I slowly lean over the table and kiss Erica, it's a long, slow, tongue brushing kiss that involves me tangling my fingers in her hair. When I pull back, she has my lip gloss smeared on her mouth but I don't comment on it. I make eye contact with the guy who was taunting his friends and give him a look that I think my mother would be proud of. He quickly turns around and looks at the menu. Wordlessly, I pull out the chair beside hers instead of across from it and take her hand. She gives me an amused look and returns to her list like nothing out of the ordinary has happened, but she rubs the back of my hand with her thumb and when she chews the lid of her pen, she still hasn't wiped off my lipgloss.

When I look back at the table where the two men are sitting ... one of them lifts his coffee cup in a silent toast.

Apparently there's a kinship among people like ... us. They're me. I'm them. I'm in love with someone of the same sex.

Big fucking deal.

That's the funniest thing to me, though. I don't look at her and think 'Wow, I'm with a woman' ... I look at her and think ... 'Wow, I'm with someone I love'. It doesn't matter to me that she has the same equipment as me. It doesn't matter that she doesn't smell like aftershave or get a five o'clock shadow. Nothing that is the same as me matters at all. As much as I like penis ... her lack of one has yet to matter. I don't look at her and think that we're doing anything out of the ordinary because everything we do feels right. We're no different than anyone else who is experiencing something new with someone and if people have to label it then they should call it what it is: happiness.

We're two people who found each other out of millions.

That's more shocking than anything we can do to each other.

When we leave Starbucks, my hand brushes hers again. She doesn't pull away this time. She loops her pinky through mine. I hate shopping. I hate shopping for clothing. I hate shopping for a new phone or a computer. I specifically hate shopping for food because that usually means someone has died and I'm going to cook something. I don't hate shopping for food with Erica, though. It's a careful process with her. She chooses vibrantly colored fruits and vegetables and painstakingly sorts through fresh herbs. By the time we head to my Range Rover, we're laden with bags and I finally understand why she wanted me to drive it instead of her Lexus. When we climb into the car, she stops me before I can turn the key.

"Callie?"

"Hmm?"

"That little statement you made at Starbucks?"

I hold my breath because her tone says that she's going to take me to the mat over it.

"I liked it," she says, leaning her elbow against the console. "Wanna do it again?"

I don't hesitate.

Kissing her has replaced my Wii as the best way to spend a day.

What doesn't rate as enjoyable is swinging by Cristina's apartment for a fresh change of clothing. Apparently Cristina has talked Meredith into loaning her all kinds of videos of Ellis Grey performing surgery and invited friends to watch. George and Izzie are sitting on my bed while Karev lounges in the chair with his scruffy boots all over my leather jacket. As soon as Cristina sees that Hahn is there ... her demeanor changes and she offers her a beer. I hear Erica suggest something with the beer bottle that makes me cringe, but I don't say anything. I kneel down at my suitcase and pull out jeans and a shirt, stuffing it into my overnight bag. I also stuff in underwear and head into the bathroom for my toothbrush. When I go back into the living room, Cristina crosses her arms and glares at me, making it very clear what she thinks of Erica.

"I'll see you tomorrow," I tell her.

"Oh?" she asks innocently. "Where are you going?"

"Uh." I can see that I'm suddenly very interesting to the others. I adjust the strap of my bag and shrug. "We're going to the, uh, spa. The one we went to before. It's a long drive so we're heading out tonight."

Izzie says something to George and they both laugh, their heads together. If she makes a gay comment ... I will murder her.

Cristina shoots me a knowing look and I purse my lips together, daring her to speak. She turns back to the video and doesn't say anything else at all.

I wrestle my coat from under Karev's boots and head out into the hallway. Erica follows and says, "Why do you live there? It's like Chinese Water Torture to even visit the place."

"It's close to the hospital."

"It's not like you're a poor intern who has no money for rent, Callie."

"I know ... it's just a place to sleep. I'm rarely even here."

We ride the elevator to the parking deck in silence.

We took two steps forward at Starbucks.

Then ten steps back in front of our coworkers.

Back at Erica's, the dog is barking like crazy and after we bring in the groceries, I go and check on him. He's in his kennel and he stops barking when he sees me and rams his nose through the bars. It breaks my heart to see him caged so I let him out and laugh at his antics. His nails click on the hardwood as he leaps up and down on me and when he hears a bag rustle downstairs, he nearly breaks his neck getting to the source.. He rushes to one of the cabinets, not bothering to acknowledge Erica, and claws at the door. I kneel down and open it and sure enough ... Erica has dog treats in every shape and size. When I clear my throat, she says that it's habit to buy him things, but I have to wonder. I think maybe she has love, unrequited love, but love for the hateful little shit. Buddha roots around in the cabinet, pawing left and right, and I pick up the bag that holds his interest. He accepts the Greenie from me and rushes to a small rug in front of the fireplace to eat it, his tail thumping the floor just as hard as his nails did.

Erica has pulled her hair up in a clip and sets about meticulously chopping bell pepper at the island. I take a sip of her wine and say, "I could be more helpful if I knew what you were cooking."

She continues to expertly dice the peppers. "I don't get it."

"Get what?"

"You'd rather live with Yang and sleep on a sofa ... than move in here."

My eyes widen. "Did I sleep through you inviting me to move in here?"

"You don't need an invitation!"

Great. A conversation that I didn't want to have. I turn to the sink and wash my hands, then pick up an onion. "Want me slice, dice, or -"

"I want you to answer me."

I pick up a knife and cut the ends off the onion. "How do you want me to cut this?"

"Dice it and answer me."

"I would love to move in here, but it's too soon." I don't look at her as I set to work on the onion. "I rushed with George. I sort of rushed with Mark because I put sex before anything else with us, but I'm not going to rush with you. I love you. I want to be with you, but the time that I spend on Cristina's sofa will make us appreciate the time that I spend here a whole lot more."

"I already appreciate it."

"I know."

"I already waited while you've slept on Cristina's sofa and in Mark's bed. So, I don't think it's rushing ... I think it's about damn time."

Buddha rushes into the kitchen, green flecks on his muzzle. He yaps a few times and charges to the sliding glass door, scratching at it. "Does he want to go for a walk?"

"Just open the door. The back yard is fenced and he will let us know when he wants to come back in."

I nod and dry my hands on a dishtowel before I open the door and step outside. I've never paid attention to the backyard before. The deck is oversized and has two levels. There's a hot tub on the bottom level that looks like it hasn't been used in years, but it only holds my attention for a second. From George's bedroom in the O'Malley house, you can sort of see the Space Needle. From the deck of Erica's house ... you can see it all. The Space Needle, Mount Rainier, and so much more. It's breathtaking. She told me once before that she bought the house for the view, but I thought she meant the woods that surround her house, but that's only part of it. All along the privacy fence there are flowerbeds, explosions of colors are everywhere. In the distance, toward the end of the rolling, well clipped grass and nested between two shade trees near the thickest of the forest, there's a white gazebo. A trickling of water catches my attention to the left and my eyes widen when I see a pond there. It's small and I can't tell if it's stocked with goldfish, but there are lily pads floating on the surface.

"You like it?" she asks suddenly, wrapping her arms around my waist.

I love the way I fit against her, my back against her chest. It's like the last puzzle piece I've been looking for is finally in place. "It's beautiful."

She rests her cheek against mine as we watch Buddha chase a bird out of the yard. "I'm not going to pressure you to move in with me, but the invitation is out there. Officially."

"Okay."

"I love you too, by the way. And waiting for you sucked ... but we're here now and that's all that matters."

The door is still open and the smells coming from the kitchen cause my stomach to rumble. "What are you cooking?"

"It's not pizza."

"Damn. That's the perfect food."

"Oh, Callie, I have so much to teach you."

"You're doing fine so far."

The only thing better than Erica's roast ... is her Hawaiian Chicken and white rice with sautéed onions. My stomach, which hasn't given me any problems since surgery, feels like it's stretching out of proportion when I finally push my plate away. We don't talk about me moving in with her again. We talk about Jazz's birthday party and my sister in law's reaction to me getting near my niece. We also talk about Addison's stiff salsa dancing and the fact that she nearly got me tazored to death by Deputy Dog after I insulted New York. And then I tell her about the walk I took on the beach with my mother and while I'm telling her about it, I notice that she's worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. "Hey," I say, touching her face. "What's wrong?"

"I'm sorry that you had to go through that with your niece. And that it was tense with your mom."

"It's okay. If my mother can come around then Mount Rainier can move. Hope will eventually realize that this is who I am and you're who I want."

I look out the glass doors toward the city, toward Rainier. The view is even prettier at night. Erica seems to know what I'm thinking because she shuts the lights off and holds out her hand, leading me back onto the deck. I sit beside her in an old fashioned glider that she tells me is a relic from her childhood home. This is life at its simplest. This is life where nothing else matters and contentment can make you feel just as full as too much dinner. I can forget everything that has happened over the past few months when she puts her arm around me and pulls me against her. The smell of the roses and daffodils and daisies are mixing with her lilacs and it's enough to make me more lightheaded than the two glasses of wine I indulged in. This is why I don't drink wine. I can have ten shots of whiskey and walk a straight line, but two glasses of wine and I'm seriously contemplating asking her to help me move the next day. And I told her the truth ... I'm just not ready for that yet.

I don't know why. The world won't stop spinning if I hang my clothes next to hers or put my toothbrush in the same cup she keeps hers in, but you know what ... it stopped spinning when I did it with Mark. It felt like I put my life on hold and time marched on, but I didn't get anywhere. I felt like I stopped living. I'm a little jaded ... I can admit that. Things change when you live with someone.

I suddenly have a startling realization. "Where's Buddha?"

We both sit up and call his name at the same time. She whistles and we wait patiently for the sound of him scrambling up the stairs of the deck. After two full minutes pass with both of us whistling and calling for him ... she starts to swear and I start to panic. We go inside and she leaves the door open as she rifles through the drawer for a flashlight. It doesn't take us long to scour the fence's perimeter and find a place where a wooden board has rotted away. It looks like Buddha took advantage of that and chewed his way through. There's a little red fur caught in the jagged edges to let us know that we're right in assuming that he clawed to freedom. I'm barefoot and as we scramble up the stairs to go inside again I can feel a splinter wedge itself in the pad of my foot, but I don't say anything. I grab my shoes and we hurry into the front yard, where we call for him again. We walk all the way to the end of the driveway. When there's no answering bark, she says, "Neither one of us can drive through the neighborhood, Callie. I'm a little tipsy and, well, he has tags on. My address is on there."

"What if he gets hit by a car?" There's a lump in my throat that won't go away. I'm pretty fond of the fur ball. The previous night, he took a running leap onto the bed and nuzzled my face until I let him under the cover. He slept against my belly and bit Erica twice on the hand when she tried to pull me closer. She told me that he had never jumped on the bed and she didn't think his short legs would do it anyway, but he not only jumped, he stayed right beside me. He was still snuggled against me when she woke me up for French Toast and if she minded that I kept sneaking slivers of bacon to him under the table... she never said a word. As a car with a too loud radio rumbles past, the tears that are threatening to fall do just that. "He's so little."

"He's fine." She hugs me. "He's a dog. Dogs have a build in GPS when it comes to finding their way home."

"But -"

"It's okay, baby. He's not that ugly. Someone will take him in for the night." With her thumbs, she wipes the moisture from my cheeks and then kisses me.

We're still kissing when a car eases to a stop beside us. It's got a quiet enough engine that what gives it away are the squeaky brakes.

That ... and my name.

Jerry O'Malley is sitting in his mother's station wagon and he's looking at me like I just grew two heads and bit him with one of them. I watch his eyes move to Erica and then Buddha appears, popping up from his lap. "I - I was just -" he stammers over the words. "Dr. Hahn, your dog was digging up my mother's tomato plants. She fed him some ham and ... well ... here he is."

Erica reaches for the dog, but Buddha growls at her. Apparently freedom didn't make him like her. I take him instead, reaching into the window. I notice that Ronnie is in the passenger seat and he's staring at me like I'm a body on the side of the road about to be zipped into a bag. "Hey, Ronnie, Jerry."

Ronnie simply nods.

Jerry looks at my mouth and says, "Whoa."

I stand up with Buddha in my arms and clear my throat. Erica thanks them for bringing the dog back and offers to pay to replace the tomato plants, but I don't hear their reply. My ears are ringing too much. When they drive off, neither of them have spoken to me, but I see Ronnie turn around in the seat to watch me and I swear that the only thing bigger than his eyes ... is his mouth. The dog whimpers and I wrinkle my nose because he's sticky and smells like tomato vines. "You're in trouble, mister," I tell him. "And you're getting a bath."

What I don't say ... is that the cat is most definitely out of the bag. Ronnie and Jerry are gossip kings. If either one of them had a handle on technology ... they would give Perez Hilton a run for his money. When George and I went to tell them all that we had eloped, Ronnie was able to rattle off a five minute list of celebrities that had tied the knot in Vegas. Jerry could pretty much tell you how long their marriages lasted. The stack of celebrity magazines in boxes in their garage would rival Jazz's comic book collection and I'd bet my ass that his collection is worth a ton of money.

I'd like to see the humor in it all. I'd like to point out that we survived Starbucks and semi-making out in the parking lot outside Pike Place, but I don't.

Something tells me that Monday at work will be very, very interesting.

I hope we're ready for it.


	10. Chapter 10

Lazy Sunday mornings are my new favorite thing. We take our breakfast onto the deck and watch Seattle come to life. It's twenty miles away on the road, but as the crow flies .. it's about ten. If that. It's so beautiful and so surreal to see a concrete jungle amidst all the trees in Erica's backyard that it's hard to look away from it. After we flip through the Sunday paper and belly laugh over the comics, we locate a large rock and lug it to the fence where Buddha got loose. It would take something much larger than an egotistical Pomeranian to get around it. For good measure, though, Erica puts a potted plant in front of it and we walk the perimeter of the fence to make sure there are no other places that he can escape from. When we let him out ... he runs right to the boulder and looks back at us like we're the biggest bitches he has ever seen in his life. He hikes his leg to show us what he thinks of it and it's so cute that I have to take twenty photos with my Blackberry. If I become that person who treats a dog like a kid ... someone needs to shoot me. I leave that afternoon and head back to Cristina's. There's a note saying that she's at Meredith's for a few days. I need to have a talk with her about throwing Burke into Erica's face so I write a note asking her to call me when she has a chance. I live with the woman and never see her.

This is the life of a doctor.

No wonder we're all fucked up.

On Monday, I am in and out of surgery for nine straight hours and sleep in the on call room for two before I'm paged to surgery again. There is something in the water or God is hitting people left and right like a screen door in a hurricane ... either way ... their broken shit is my gain because I'm back in the zone. George winds up scrubbing in with me on my last surgery. Neither of us speak past me asking him a few questions about the procedure and he parrots textbook answers back to me like the book is open in front of him. I can tell that he impresses a couple of new interns who exchange looks as I hand him the reigns and let him put the finishing touches on the rod in the patient's leg. He looks like he enjoys the procedure as much as I would enjoy receiving rectal surgery, but he thanks me all the same. I stitch the patient quickly and ask what the follow up care should consist of and he rattles off exactly what I would recommend. I tell him he did well and go to the scrub room to take off my surgical gown. A moment later, he enters behind me and pulls his own off.

"So, you're gay now?"

I purse my lips together behind my mask. I haven't taken it off yet and I'm oddly comforted by having it there. It can shield the fact that my lips will possibly tremble if he goes for the jugular. "If you're asking me if I'm with Erica ... then the answer is yes."

"You're gay."

"I'm me."

"You weren't gay when we were married. Uh ... were you?"

I tug the covers off my sneakers and pull off my cap. "No, George."

"But you are now?"

Labels. Story of my freakin' life. I can't outrun labels. I was 'the little woman' with him, even though I've got a couple of inches on him. I went from 'newlywed' to 'jilted wife' to 'divorcee' in a span of weeks. I don't know if the jokes at my expense were as bad as the sympathetic looks from a handful of people. There's no sympathy card for getting a divorce. If there is ... I didn't get one. I didn't get anything except a stack of papers with my signature and his and the truth that we had nothing to divide among us. It's so bizarre that a marriage, which is supposed to last forever, takes one piece of paper ... but dissolving that marriage requires twenty two. I counted. Repeatedly. I flipped through them until they were dog eared and tear stained and I still couldn't find any answers there. He asked for nothing ... I asked for his heart all along and he withheld it the entire time. It wasn't his to give me. His heart was buried with his dad for a while and then it was with Izzie.

I lean against the sink and look at him. He's still got his mask on, too, and his green eyes look the same way they did when he told me that his father's death filled his stomach with asphalt. They're dancing with something that I don't quite know how to place. I can't tell if he wants to laugh at me or if he's trying to understand me because he knows what it's like to hide something 'forbidden'. What he has with Izzie, if they're even together now, left the same bad taste in my mouth that I left in my mother's the morning she found Erica in my bed. I told George it was a sin the same way my mom told me that I had sinned, but now I see that the edges can be blurred and the heart doesn't recognize it as 'sin' at all. I don't hate him anymore. I don't even dislike him, really, because I've walked in his shoes and I know that denying yourself what you really want can be just as bad as giving in and being labeled.

"I'm with Erica," I finally repeat. "And that's all I'm going to say."

"You're happy?"

"I am."

"Then I'm happy." He takes off his mask and smiles at me. "Ronnie and Jerry, for the record, were also very happy. They already thought that you were the coolest human being alive because you could kick their ass at Mario Brothers and pick better cars, but now ... well, Ronnie's exact words were 'dude, it was hotter than being tied up with Wonder Woman's lasso'. I was amused."

"Ronnie has been tied up with Wonder Woman's lasso?"

"He thinks he has. He got drunk once on my dad's stash of homemade beer and we tied him up with a jump rope. He passed out staring at a poster of Lynda Carter and that's pretty much all he remembers." George laughs. It's been a long time since I heard it. "I'm going to need you to update your 'Date and Tell' sheet. Dr. Hahn, too."

"Okay." I nod at him.

He starts to leave, then pauses at the door. "For what it's worth ... I really like her. She's a badass."

"Nah, that's a front."

"Cal?"

"Hmm?"

He looks at me for a little longer than I'm comfortable with and I squirm under his scrutiny. "I really am sorry ... for everything. You deserved better and I hope that she can be everything I wasn't."

I don't bother telling him that she's already everything to me. That would hurt his feelings and I don't want that on my conscious.

His acceptance, for some reason, makes me feel twenty pounds lighter.

The fact that I didn't tell him to keep a secret increases that weight to fifty.

I make the decision to take her hand in the hallway.

My best laid plans are foiled repeatedly. I don't see Erica at all on Monday because we're both so busy. I wind up sleeping in the on call room because of a sunrise surgery that I didn't plan on, but can't back out of either. Being able to sit down and eat breakfast afterward is a luxury and I enjoy every second of it on Tuesday morning. I pick up a medical magazine and absently flip through it as I enjoy a sugary Pop Tart that would make Erica insane. She's been on my ass about my diet hot and heavy. She left an apple, a banana, and a Spiderman lunchbox in my locker. I don't know what's in it yet, but I'm sure it's healthy. She has taken it upon herself to be my personal food Yoda and I don't even mind.

I don't listen, really ... as showcased by the Pop Tart wasteland I also trudged through for dinner, but I love that she cares.

I scan through the magazine, looking at different articles and then my eyes fall on a full page feature about progressive treatment for patients with brain damage. That gets my attention. I read the article twice before I pick up my second Pop Tart and bite into it. I'm going to need progressive treatment to help my own brain now that so many facts and findings are bouncing around it. According to the article, clinical trials are underway at several hospitals across the country on a procedure called the Fellman-Caputo Technique. Small electrodes, tinier than the tip of a ball point pen, are inserted into the damaged area of the brain and stimulated with low dosage frequencies to promote healing. In other words ... the parts of Jazz's brain that are silent ... can be forced to speak. At least that's what the article says. Out of forty initial candidates, four died ... and over twenty responded positively. Three who could not previously make a sound ... were able to say their name within six months. The remainder had no change.

"I'll take that."

I look up when Erica snatches the Pop Tart from my hand and puts a bowl of oatmeal in front of me. "Ew, gross. Are you trying to kill me?"

"It has been over twenty four hours since I saw you so I will refrain from kicking your ass for stuffing it with sodium and carbs."

"It's been closer to thirty hours, Yellow, but who's counting?"

She hands me a spoon. "Me."

"I'll eat that if you read this." I hand her the magazine and she takes a bite of her own oatmeal. I watch her lick the spoon ... and can't stop watching. Damn her ... she's doing that shit on purpose. Nobody licks the spoon when they eat oatmeal. They gag on the spoon and possibly resent the spoon, but licking is out of the question. Oatmeal? Sucks. I take one bite and try not to cough up a lung for my efforts. I make it through a second bite before I push it away and she clears her throat, but doesn't say anything. When she puts the magazine down beside her tray, I hold my breath. "Well?"

"Do you want to take him to one of the approved hospitals or bring the trial to Seattle Grace?"

"No one has better hands than Derek Shepherd." I watch her eyebrow go up and quickly add, "No guy. No brain guy has better hands than Shepherd. And if we could get approval and then teach that method to newcomers ... more people like Jazz could have a chance."

She isn't eating now. "He could die."

"He won't."

"Callie-"

"He always does what I tell him. If I tell him to come back ... he will."

Picking up the magazine, she skims the article again. "You'll have to convince Shepherd and considering that he is Sloan's best friend ... that could be a tough sell."

"Derek has ego and he'll make the books if ... no ... when he pull this off."

She studies me the same way she studied the article. I don't think she shares my optimism. "What will your parents say?"

"Shit. I didn't think about them."

"It'll take weeks to get this off the ground anyway. That will give you time to convince them, but I think you should research it more and get a lot more facts. I'll help you."

"Thank you." My pager goes off suddenly and I want to throw it across the room. "By the way, George knows. He asked me about us."

"What did you tell him?"

"The truth."

"What's the truth?"

"That I'm madly in love with you and can't concentrate on anything I'm supposed to be doing because I'd rather be doing you."

She smiles at me, then looks around the crowded cafeteria. "Wanna give me another Starbucks kiss?"

Before I can take her up on the offer, Webber walks up and asks her about her next surgery. I hope he can feel my agitation when I say goodbye and head to the ER for an incoming trauma.

I can't believe I was actually excited about coming back to work ... and working my ass off.

There are so many other ... things ... that I could be working on. For instance ... I'm fairly certain her bra strap needs attention ... and her panties.

It's almost eleven when I finally get to shower and the splinter in my foot makes its presence known. The water makes the wood and my vocabulary swell impressively. I bathe fast and attempt to remove it to no avail. Donning fresh socks and leaving my shoe untied, I crab walk across the hallway into the supply closet and prowl around until I find tweezers. I should have taken care of it at Erica's but that would have been too simple and I was in a little bit of shock after being caught with my tongue in her mouth by Ronnie and Jerry. I sit down on a crate and set to work on the splinter. A moment later, the door is shoved open and the handle pops me in the side of the head hard enough to addle my senses. Falling to one side, I squeeze my eyes shut to stop seeing stars. "Shit! Watch what you're doing!"

"Oh my god!" Addison descends on me like the second coming and half drags me back onto the crate. "Are you okay?"

My left eye is watering from the blow and I'm pretty sure the splinter was shoved up to my knee after I put my sole flat on the floor to stabilize myself, but I nod at her. "First jail and now skull fractures. I'm so glad we're friends."

"Well, stop hiding in the closet! Literally!"

"You can't give me advice after you've given me a concussion because I won't remember it."

"What are you doing?"

"Giving myself a pedicure. Obviously."

"Well, I don't know where you get foot work done, but you're not supposed to bleed."

"I wasn't bleeding until the doorknob went through my head and out my ass."

"Such a child."

"Such a klutz."

I go back to work, painstakingly pulling at the the piece of wood that keeps breaking apart on me. Before I can protest, she kneels down beside me and runs her thumb over it. "It's deep," she says, taking the tweezers from me.

I take them back fast. "I've got this."

"Don't be a baby."

"If the splinter was in my vagina ... we'd be good to go."

"If you had a splinter in your vagina ... I'd be more interested in how it got there than taking it out." She snatches the tweezers again and I hold my breath. "Don't move."

"Don't hobble me."

The sliver of wood comes out without much coaxing on her part and she grins when she holds it up. "Magic Hands Montgomery. That's what they called me in college."

"Thank you, Magic, I appreciate it."

She reaches behind her and finds a couple of alcohol swabs. "This may burn."

I try to pull my sock back on, but she doesn't let me. She dabs at the spot with the pad ... then she squeezes it until alcohol rolls over it. It's cold, then it stings like I just stepped in a beehive. Yes, the splinter was that big! Okay, maybe it wasn't that bad, but I have no threshold for pain and I am not afraid to admit that. Pain is not fun or character building and the people who come up with slogans that tell you that it is are probably into bondage and like blades under their fingernails. If I stub my toe ... it will ruin my week and a paper cut has the ability to affect how well I will treat interns on any given day. Sue me. We all have our thing. "Addison ... OH MY GOD!"

"HOLD STILL!"

"YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG!"

"THERE ISN'T A RIGHT WAY, CALLIE! JUST ... STOP SQUIRMING!"

The door opens again and this time ... the knob hits her and she gets whacked in the head. She falls forward and I sprawl onto the floor with her on top of me, laughing my ass off when she grunts like a pig. "Your head is way more hollow than mine, Addy. I heard it."

"Ow! Shut up!" She massages her temple and sits up. "I didn't hit you that hard."

"What are you two doing?" Mark demands, glaring down at us with his hands on his hips. "Did I miss the memo that all the women were going butch?"

"Don't be an asshole. It's not cute." Addison adjusts her jacket and reaches for Neosporin, which she holds out to me. "You need to put this on your foot and bandage it."

"Oh ... look at that," I say, pointing at my name on my jacket. "I'm a doctor, too."

"What happened?" Mark asks me. "Are you -"

"She's fine," Addy snaps. "Help me up!"

Mark helps her to her feet, then holds his hand out to me, but I shake my head. "I gotta finish up."

As he goes out the door with her, I hear him say, in a very, very loud voice, "If you're going to make out with Torres ... at least do it in the open. That was hot."

I close my eyes. I'm sure that Erica is in the hallway and he said it for her benefit.

I quickly pull my sock and shoe back on and stand up. My foot is tender and I make a mental note to tell Addison that her hands aren't that magical as I brace myself for whatever's on the other side of the door. Just as I suspected, Erica is at the nurse's station with an open chart in front of her. She looks shocked to see me emerge from the closet after Mark's announcement and I ignore Karev when he says that he would also like to see me and Addison throw down. I stand next to her and say, "I wasn't -"

"I don't need you to tell me that." She makes a note and flips a page. "Even if Sloan wasn't a first class dickhead, I trust you. I also trust that you will be coming to my place after work."

"Definitely."

She turns to face me, leaning her elbow against the counter a few inches away from me. "I should be off at five thirty. How about you?"

"Same." I make a fist because I'm dying to touch her hair. It's curly again, like mine, and I wonder if it's because she is no longer straightening any aspect of herself just to fit in. She told me once that she refused to date coworkers because it distracted her from doing her job. We put our heads together one day before I started messing around with Mark and made fun of Meredith and Derek, Izzie and George, and all the other little couples who went out of their way to be pathetic. Now ... we are an airbrushed shirt away from raising the bar on the couple clichés. She's wearing a pair of my earrings that I left at her house and I've got a necklace tucked under my shirt with an 'E' dangling on the end. She said that it was the only nice thing her adoptive father ever gave her and it was in the pawn shop more often than out of it, but he somehow got it back every time. I've also got the bracelet on that she gave me and I've heard more than once that it's beautiful. "You look pretty, Erica."

She looks down at my lips and I lean forward in anticipation.

She doesn't kiss me.

She starts to, but Mark reaches between us and plucks a chart from the pile. The charts are technically behind me and he could have gone around me, but that's not his style. He looks down at me, his back to Erica, and says, "O'Malley gave you a grace period before he started making out with Stevens all over the hospital. Do me the same favor and don't parade your whore all over the place."

"Go away, Sloan," Erica says softly. "While I can still turn the other cheek."

"Don't bother turning the other cheek, Hahn, it's just as ugly."

"And this, ladies and gentlemen, is a completely justified inferiority complex," she says with a smile, gesturing at him like Vanna White. "I worship the ground that awaits your body, shit ass."

"You look like you've already been dead and buried for a ten years, zombie."

"Awww, that's a low blow. And speaking of ... how's your mother?" she fires back.

"Go back to Hell, Satan."

"Go lick your wounds, puppy."

"YOU NEED TO MIND YOUR OWN DAMN BUSINESS!" Mark shouts, whirling to face her.

"CALLIE IS MY BUSINESS!" Erica yells back. "LEAVE HER ALONE!"

"DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO, BITCH!"

"HEY!" Addison suddenly arrives on the scene, drying her hands on tissue. She grabs Mark's arm and says, "I thought we were having lunch."

"YOU'RE ON HER SIDE!" Mark accuses. "WHY DON'T YOU JUST ASK TO JOIN IN AND HAVE A THREESOME!?"

"YOU BEGGED FOR A THREESOME, YOU FUCK WIT!" Erica shoves his shoulder over Addison's.

That's enough for me. I leave as the conversation rises another octave.

I stalk down the hall and hit the elevator button. My ears are threatening to explode from the pressure in my head and I'm shaking hard enough to rattle my teeth, but I keep going. When I step into the elevator, Addison rushes in behind me. She doesn't say anything and I'm almost relieved to have her company until she hits the stop button and the elevator grinds to a screeching, squealing, and bumpy halt. We stop so hard, that my knees buckle and I almost tumble forward, but catch myself at the last minute. The lift creaks and moans, then drops about three inches and stops again. That time ... I do fall. So does Addison. Sitting on the floor, we stare at one another as the elevator gives us a chorus of bangs and thumps. Then the light panel goes haywire ... darkness falls over us like midnight and a vicious metallic crunch rattles the floor beneath us.

It takes a second, but the emergency lights come on and I glare at her. "You really are a black cloud of doom."

"Apparently." Pushing herself to her knees, she opens the phone panel and presses numbers. "Hello? Hello? It's dead."

"Of course it is." I cross my arms over my chest and lean back against the wall. "We're on the second floor ... so ... if it falls ... we'll probably break a few bones, but it won't kill us."

"OH MY GOD!" she snaps, still pressing buttons. "If this is you trying to be positive then stop it!"

"Here's a thought ... use your cell phone."

She makes a face. "Here's a better thought ... use yours."

I sigh. "You don't have yours, do you?"

She shakes her head. "You don't either, huh?"

"Nope."

"Ten minutes. They'll have us out in ten minutes." She sits down next to me at the wall. "Should we yell and make noise?"

"If it's not ten minutes ... that'll use up oxygen. In case you failed to notice ... there's no air in this bitch." I don't want to say what needs to be said because Addison is known for her freak outs and I could truly witness a monumental panic attack, but I have to tell her. "Addy?"

"Yeah?"

"We're on a freight elevator. Tuesday? Not shipping day. Unless someone dies and needs to be sent to the funeral home via Fed-Ex ... we may be here for a while."

Just as I expected she would, she leaps to her feet and starts pounding on the door. "HELP!! HELPPPP!!"

I count to ten. Then fifteen.

She gives up on thirty.

I watch her sit back down and put a hand over her mouth. It's almost comical ... actually ... it is comical. Because this is just. my. luck.

"I swear to God ... if you start laughing ... there will be a hair tugging girl fight," she says.

I can't help it. I roll on the floor for a second. "You know what I just thought?"

"What?"

I snort. "Derek keeps up with his elevators. He'll sense a disturbance in the force field any time now."

She flops down on her back and laughs with me.

True friends will laugh with you to keep you from crying.

Neither one of us is wearing a watch, but the temperature in the elevator heats up fast enough for me to think that time is passing a lot quicker than I think. It could be a half hour, possibly a full hour. When my shirt is soaked with sweat and rivulets are running down my temples, I look up at the ceiling. There's a small utility door there and I wonder if it can be opened to let in some blessed cool air. Maybe if we can open it ... we can get out of it. My hopes are dashed when I realize that it's padlocked from the inside, which may be the stupidest thing I've ever witnessed in my life. Shouldn't elevators be like car trunks? I should invent an escape hatch and mass market it to people who panic the way Addison does. I watch her roll off her stockings and wiggle her bare toes. That's a good idea. I take off my shoes and socks and she smacks my arm when she sees that I didn't bother with bandaging my foot. I pull off my outer scrub shirt and tug at the tank top I'm wearing under it. "Should it be this fucking hot in here?"

"This is the fifth dimension of Hell," she tells me.

"What's actual Hell?"

"If this thing falls," she says. "That's Hell."

"Let's talk about something else."

"Okay," she replies. "Do you know what I did last night?"

"No."

"I spent hours listening to Mark stop just short of comparing you to a summer's day. I listened to every detail of your life together while he drank himself into a stupor and then he blamed me for everything that went wrong."

"How did he arrive at that exactly?"

"Apparently he knows that I had sex with Alex before our sixty days were up and never told me. Then I left before I let him look at me like Derek looks at Meredith and it's my fault that you are an evil cheater because if I had not left then he would have still loved me." She rubs her face with her jacket, mopping up sweat. "Where did you sleep last night? Because it doesn't matter where you say ... you were all over that apartment."

"He's a talkative drunk, huh?"

"Very."

I cough uncomfortably. "So are you. In Miami ... you said some things. Not all of it was nice."

She meets my eyes and holds it for a second. "I vaguely remember invoking the friend rule and telling you that you broke it by being with him. I may also vaguely remember calling you a conniving bitch."

"Do you vaguely remember telling me that you never stopped loving him? That you're in love with him and that the reason it can't work with Pete is because he's not Mark?" I fan my shirt again. I'm light headed now. "You did say that. And you know what? You're all over Mark's apartment, too. He called me Addison twice and he never even caught himself. Old ghosts ... they haunt you hard and you dogged my steps as much as you did his. Don't be pissed at me for sleeping with him and don't be pissed that I hurt him because you hold the record on doing both of things things the exact same way I did."

"What is that supposed to mean!?"

"You used him for sex! You told me you did! You told me that you were embracing the 'hailstorm of misery and self loathing' again because it was better than being alone. And you were kinda committed to him when you slept with Alex ... you were committed to sixty days anyway. I broke up with Mark before I slept with Erica. And I may have left him, but you left him a lot worse because you left TOWN."

"I don't want to be stuck in an elevator with you." She crosses her arms over her chest. "Because now I'm mad as hell and I'm hot and you smell bad."

"You smell worse. At least I don't have the lingering aroma of powdered baby asses and breast milk on me."

"I do not smell like breast milk!"

"But you do smell like a powdered ass."

"You look like a powdered ass."

"Lack of oxygen is making your comebacks very, very lame."

"No ... not meaning it does that." She reaches over and takes my hand. "I wish I could hate you."

"I know." I squeeze it, then lean my head against her shoulder. "We're women, Addy. Hating each other over a man is dumb."

"I don't see you singing 'We Are The World' with Stevens."

"Have you heard that song? That's why."

She rests her cheek against the top of my head. "We could die in here."

"Think of it as a sauna."

"We're losing a lot of fluid." She touches my head, then hands me her lab coat.

I mop sweat off me, but it's no use. I keep pouring and she does, too. I'll never cook a fucking turkey again and watch it boil in its own juices. "I'm glad we're in this together, Addison."

"Me, too, Callie. If we get out of this alive ... I'm gonna apologize for calling you a conniving bitch."

"If we get out of this alive ... I'll happily buy you drinks until you foam at the mouth again and I won't even complain."

"There was foam?"

"Big time."

"I'm kinda gross."

"True."

"I want an ice cold Strawberry Daiquiri."

What I want ... is a huge bottle of water and a cool bath. Or ... to be riding the waves in Miami on a jet ski with the wind in my hair and the cool mist of the water keeping me from being overheated. What they say is true ... when you think you're going to die ... your life flashes through your mind one image at a time like a slide show. Unfortunately, my brain also plays the theme song from 'Dirty Dancing' as the montage flashes in my head, but that's not really worth mentioning. I had the time of my life, okay? What is worth mentioning ... is that I linger over moments with Jazz as a normal little boy, his dirty face gleaming after he got into Halloween candy. And I linger just as long over Jazz the way he is now ... the perfect, humble, easy going, and happy man that he has become. And finally ... I linger over Erica. She's like the wind ... shit ... another 'Dirty Dancing' song ... I need to throw that movie away ... and ...

No ... no ... she IS the wind and she's bringing a nice, stiff breeze with her when she appears in the open doorway of the elevator.

I hear her voice and feel something close around my face as cool oxygen filters through a mask.

Why are there paramedics in a hospital? We already have doctors, oooh, but there are firemen, too.

Pretty, pretty firemen with their pretty, pretty hats.

Three hours.

That's how long we were in the elevator.

It turns out that at the precise moment that Addison hit the stop button, the brakes malfunctioned, cut the phone cord, and then the failsafe kicked in and halted us. The failsafe caused one wing of the hospital to lose power and the backup generator nearly ran itself to death to power up. The backup generator? Almost directly under the freight elevator which is why we came out of the ordeal well done and leathery. That thing can throw off some heat. According to the firemen ... we wouldn't have made it another thirty minutes, but I think that firemen are genetically predisposed to lie. I mean, they work with a big hose all day ... I'm just saying.

The best part about being rescued from the fifth dimension of Hell is actually not the cool fluid going into my veins or the endless cups of icy water. It's not the air conditioner blowing in my face or the wide open expanse of the ER. No ... the best part of being rescued ... is that Erica kisses me. In front of everyone. She plants one on me that would have made me breathless, you know, if I wasn't already. There are no gasps and the world doesn't tilt off its axis. I see Richard blink a couple of times and then he turns his attention to a crooked blind, but there are no angry outbursts or shouts of righteous indignation. I made more of a big just thinking about it than anyone else did. That makes me feel like a grade A horse's ass. I don't like people very much, but I really should stop underestimating everyone. I spent so long expecting the worst ... that I'm actually shocked at the best case scenario.

And grateful, too.

When I drink my third cup of water, I start having chills. It's a combination of the temperature change and the fact that the fluids going into me are being rushed. I also have to pee and because Miranda thinks of everything ... she has a basin added to the toilet to measure my urine output. Erica is taking the nursemaid thing to extremes. I don't say anything about her hovering because I feel guilty as hell since she spent a lot of time sitting beside Rachel's bed. That's the main reason I don't object to her being my shadow in the bathroom either. She doesn't just walk me to the door, she comes inside. I'm dizzy and a lethargic so I get why she's here ... but I have to also wonder if she's keeping me close enough to make sure she has beaten death away from me completely. She couldn't beat it back from Rachel ... and Erica Hahn looks like she's gone a few rounds with the Grim Reaper at the moment. Bailey told me she almost came through the doors with her scalpel when the firemen said that it would take a while longer.

I finish my business, wash my hands, and hug her. In nothing but my ugly baby blue hospital socks, she has about three inches on me in her sneakers. I like it. I'm not the tall one anymore. I need to ask her if kids at school called her an 'Amazon woman', too. "I'm okay."

"The only other time I've been this scared ... is when I had you open on my table and your heart stopped."

I feel her tremble and rub her back. "My heart didn't stop this time."

"Mine did." She takes my hand and lays it between her breasts. "Feel it?"

"Always." I move my palm against her scrub shirt, then kiss her neck, feeling her pulse against my lips. "All I ever do is feel you, Erica."

"I wonder how much you'll feel me when I tell you that I called your mother."

"HAHN!"

"Ooooh, use of the last name."

"Shit!"

"I'm sure she's waiting by the phone so you really should call her back and while I have your attention ... can you tell me why your phone was in your locker?"

"Shit!"

Holding out my cell, she says, "Call her back."

"Why? She's on her way!"

"Oh ... shit."

"Yay! You caught up!" I lean back against the sink and close my eyes. "God! This is the worst day of my life. Again!"

"I'm sorry. I just - I needed to talk to someone and - she loves you, too."

I run a hand through my hair. It feels like a matted dog so I stop while I'm ahead. "Was she nice to you?"

"Yeah, actually she was. She helped me yell at the firemen." She pushes the hair off my forehead. If she minds that it feels like a dirty Maltese, she doesn't let it show. "They're letting you go and I took the rest of the day off. Let's go to my place and you can rest."

"I don't -"

"Please?"

"My parents will probably be here soon."

"Well, I have a couple of spare rooms and they're welcome to stay with me. With us."

"Think about what you're saying. My mother ... she's ... unpredictable. And a little crazy. And your house is big, but not big enough for both of our attitudes, much less hers."

"I happen to think that you and I do just fine there."

"Is that your way of asking me to move in again?"

"Yep. I'm going to keep asking, by the way."

Dr. Bailey interrupts our next kiss, but she doesn't see it. She knocks on the door and checks my urine content before deciding that I'm good to go. Addison is being discharged at the same time that I am. Poor Chief Webber looks like a man who has been put through the wringer since he darted back and forth between our rooms like a man possessed. He gives me a hard pat on the back, telling me that he'll make sure my charts for the day are completed. It's his way of saying 'I am very sorry you nearly died in my hospital and because of that you can operate and not write about it. Amen'. He also says that he better not see me or Addison over the next two days because we're off. I protest for all of ten seconds because I have a surgery scheduled and I'm excited for it ... but he stares me down and says, "Not negotiable".

When he walks off, I narrow my eyes at Addison. "I just got back to work and found my groove and look what you did."

"What I did?" She pats her hair and wrinkles her nose at me. "Do I look as bad as you do?"

"Think long haired mutant meets tsunami of mange," I say.

"Jesus." With a sigh, she hugs me. "You okay?"

"I'm fine. You?"

In a low voice, she whispers, "Wouldn't have nearly died with anybody else."

"Me either."

"Sorry about the bitch thing." She smiles at me, then at Erica. "Take care of her."

"Who's taking care of you?" I ask, before Erica can reply.

The answer comes when Mark walks around the corner carrying a bright red Prada purse. He hands it to Addison, then looks at me as if it causes him physical pain to see me. He doesn't ask if I'm okay. The fact that I'm standing there looking like a street urchin in my tank top screams that I'm okay. My shirt says 'Taste the Rainbow' which I actually bought months ago ... because I like Skittles and not because I was into any kind of rainbow except the kind in a bowl of Fruit Loops, but that's not the point. It's a slap in his face now and I cross my arms over my chest self consciously when he glances at the colors splashed on my boobs. He nods at me and says, "Hope you feel better."

When they walk away ... Mark throws his arm around Addison's shoulder.

That's the Sloan way of holding her hand.

She doesn't seem to mind it the way I did. She actually leans her head against his shoulder and I really, really hope that there are no ghosts at his apartment tonight because she needs him. And he needs her.

"You ready?"

I turn and look at Erica. She's got my purse over her shoulder and my earrings on and my heart is in her teeth. She could hurt me if she wanted to, but I don't think she would. I'm not stupid enough to think that she isn't capable of destroying me ... she did a bang up job at Seattle Skyline Inn, but I trust her with me. I trust what I feel for her and I don't know what will happen down the road, but I'm damn glad that she's along for the ride. I'm not making any statements when I hold my hand out to her ... I reach because I have to and when our fingers lace together ... my heart isn't in her teeth anymore ... it's wrapped up in hers. I feel like Angela Chase in 'My So Called Life' when Jordan takes her hand in the hall after secretly making out with her in the boiler room. He was embarrassed because she wasn't the prettiest or the coolest and he kept it a secret. He forced her to keep it a secret. I watched that scene a million and one times after I taped it off the television and I wanted to smile the way that she does at that moment ... because when people stared at her ... it was because they knew she was happy.

I'm smiling that way now.

I don't even notice the people around me.

I'm in Erica's world.

And she's all I can see.

Despite my best efforts, I can't get in touch with my parents. If I know them ... they're halfway to Seattle and my mother is probably in the cockpit trying to fly the plane faster. She did that once before. She didn't try to take over, but after the third unexpected layover during a family vacation to Colorado she marched up to the cockpit, knocked on the door, and made it very clear that if the pilot couldn't stay in the air she would light a fire under his ass to make landing hurt. This was before September Eleventh and I'm sure she'll get tackled and handcuffed if she tries that shit now, but that doesn't mean she won't create enough of a commotion to make the pilot hammer down and get her here so she will shut the hell up. That's my mother ... she's got all the gentle Southern breeding that a beauty queen from Valdosta, Georgia should have, but she's also got all the bite of a Georgia bulldog. They have very big mouths.

The only thing that compares to the view from Erica's backyard is the master bathroom. It's big and airy, with neutral tiles and dark cherry cabinets. The shower is glass and has a long bench that makes shaving your legs ever so simple, but the best part is the bathtub. It's flanked on either size by large floor to ceiling pillars that make me feel like a Greek Goddess as I step into the tub and lean back in the warm water. The difference between this house and the O'Malley house ... is the difference between night and day. It's double the size of theirs and despite being in the same subdivision, it doesn't have any of the distinctions of theirs. Erica told me a while back that the original house was gutted and remodeled by the previous owner, who scooped up the lots on either side of the house to make a grand total of six acres. It's fancy in a way that isn't overdone. I could live here and be happy. I SHOULD live here and be happy.

My eyes are closed when the water shifts. I feel her foot against my thigh and smile when she covers my body with hers. The tub almost spills over, but doesn't. With her naked breasts against mine, she says, "Mind if I join you?"

I shake my head and kiss her. "I feel just fine so if you're gonna join me ... you should make the most of it."

"You're not on your -"

"Just for future reference ... it lasts for three days. I can bank on that like clockwork."

"So, I could have done this," she slips her hand between my legs, "yesterday."

"All day long." I hiss when her fingers find THAT spot and her mouth finds mine.

It's over for me in a matter of minutes ... or possibly seconds.

When I return the favor ... she splashes water all over the place and nearly drowns both of us.

I only thought that I was the loud one.

My cell phone finally rings when I'm half asleep on Erica's sofa. It's Joel and he reads me the riot act before asking if I'm okay. How I can be blamed for an elevator clusterfuck is beyond me, but he finds a way to do it. He actually makes me feel guilty as hell for not taking the stairs like I'm somehow responsible for all the ills in the world by stepping into an elevator and pressing a button. He confirms that my parents are on the way with Jasper and that he only got the voice mail a few seconds before he called me. I need to tell my mother not to call him again unless I'm dead because he can't possibly preach at me and make me feel sinful for dying. Wait ... Joel probably makes God feel guilty ... he's that damn good. When we hang up, I call the airport and get the arrival time for my parent's plane.

Less than an hour.

No naps here.

Erica knows me well. She drives my Range Rover to the airport, holding my hand on the gear shifter and says, "Stop worrying."

"We really should get them a hotel room."

"If we offer to let them stay with us and they say no ... we'll take them to the Archfield, but we have to offer."

I take a deep, calming breath. "I apologize in advance for anything that my mother says or does. Assuming there is a Heaven ... when she gets there ... she's gonna bitch about something."

"I can take it."

"And they're gonna know that I don't live with you because none of my things are there."

"Then I'll make sure I mention that I've asked you repeatedly and you'd rather sleep on a dingy sofa and keep your things in packed up in storage."

"Do NOT tell them that I live with Cristina. That will make my mother's head spin and she'll think that I'm sleeping with her, too. When Addison visited me Florida, Mom acted like I was going to molest her. I think she slept standing sentry outside my door."

Erica pulls into a parking space and shuts the engine off. "Look at me."

"Maybe I should -"

"Look at me," she repeats and waits for me to meet her eyes. "The only thing I know about kids is that they're gangly, rambunctious things that make a lot of noise and break stuff. I think that good parents, like yours, want to see their brats happy. So, we're going to show your mother that we're happy and we're going to be just fine doing it, Callie, because this is a cakewalk compared to everything else we've been through."

"Did you just call me a brat?"

"Sounds about right." She lifts my hand to her mouth and presses her lips against it. "I love you."

I lean across the console and kiss her. "I love you, too."

When we get out of the car and head into the airport, I take her hand again. Her fingers are long and slender and they wrap around mine perfectly. I notice a couple of glances as we look at the arrival board, but that's all they are. I glance back to let them register that yes, you did just see two tall, very different looking women holding hands and yes, pervert, we've done it. I yawn and rest my head on her shoulder as we wait for the board to update. She kisses my nose and points at a row of seats, but I hear someone say, "Hi, Yellow, hi!" and I'm not tired anymore. Jazz is walking toward us with his shoes on the wrong feet and his shorts pulled up high enough to give himself a wedgie. His shirt is tucked in and his baseball cap is crooked and I am so taking him shopping for t-shirts and shorts that are not khaki. He's twenty-five. He shouldn't look like he's been raiding my father's closet. Hell, even my father dresses better than that ... Hawaiian shirts notwithstanding.

Jasper gives me a kiss, but he does it in passing because the only thing he sees is the warmth of Erica's smile and her open arms. He steps into her embrace and closes his eyes. He smiles the same way I do when she hugs me ... that's what contentment looks like. I spot my parents and my mother starts crying as her short, chubby legs propel her toward me. I meet her and skip complaining as she fawns all over me. Sometimes ... a mother's touch is like coming home ... no matter where you happen to be. My dad ... he hugs us both and that makes it even better. I assure them both that I'm fine and that no, the hospital isn't defective or dangerous, then add, "Erica's going to ask you to stay at her house. If you're going to make it weird or hurtful, say no. But if you'd like to get to know the person I want to spend my life with, say yes."

Ah, there she is. Miss Valdosta pulls herself up to her full and miniscule height as she nods at me, then she looks at Erica. I watch her throat constrict and her double chin wobble a little as she slowly swallows down the bitter pill that says this is my life and my decision and the only choice here ... is hers. Handing me her luggage, Mom rubs her hands together and walks her delicate size sixes through the airport like a runway has been erected and she's modeling ugly plaid wear with mismatched hats. "Erica, hello. How are you?"

"I'm fine, Mrs. Torres." Erica accepts the hand she holds out, then her eyes widen when Lori Anne pulls her down for a hug.

"I've told you, honey, to call me Lori Anne." Reaching up, she pats Erica on the cheek. "Thank you for calling me."

"Thank you for coming."

"Thank you ... for ... Yellow." Jazz runs his fingers through Erica's hair and she gives him a kiss on the cheek. He stops moving, eyes wide as he rests his hand against the spot that she pecked.

My mother walks out with Erica, her arm through hers as my father follows, shooting me a look that says, 'No, I didn't have your mother cloned with someone nicer ... that's really her. And getting her to this point has exhausted me.'

Jazz is still standing there, watching Erica with his mouth hanging open. I nudge him. "Jazz?"

"Yellow ... kiss."

"I know." I take his hand and pull him along with me. "You're doomed, buddy. There's no coming back from that."

"Buddy, too!"

"How are you?"

"Daw-phin!" He stops walking to take his backpack off. He kneels down and digs through it, not bothered in the least by causing a roadblock in the middle of a busy airport. I can't say anything to him. I wait patiently for him to find what he's looking for and he finally holds up a different mural lamp than the one he usually falls asleep watching. This one has every underwater animal imaginable on it. "Look, Lee! New! Whale! Daw-phin! Turtle!"

He points at every animal on the whimsical display. He gets the starfish confused with a stingray and scratches his head in confusion when he realizes that there are sharks there. One thing my mother has taught him ... is to fear sharks. "Bad!" he says, pointing at a great white. "Bad, bad fish."

My mother is obviously trying to give him nightmares with his new nightlight.

I can't wait to chase the bad, bad fish on the ceiling with him later.

And I can't wait to show my parents the article I stumbled across in the magazine.

If they agree to it ... he won't have to chase anything.

He can catch up.


	11. Chapter 11

My mother is a great conversationalist, but she's a nervous complimentor. When we get to Erica's house, I've told the story about the elevator, stretching it to fill the minutes because awkward silences in a car have a tendency to suck. I know I'm babbling, but it's better than the alternative, which is counting mile markers while my mother glares at the back of my head. Erica parks in the garage next to her Lexus and my mother fawns over the car even though I distinctly remember her saying that she hated them. The fawning continues into the 'mud room' and then the living room and I don't know if Mom is trying to apologize for her behavior in Miami by killing us with kindness or if she's just afraid of the big, scary lovers and what we might say, but it's overdone. Something smells amazing in the kitchen and Erica tells us that she threw some stuff in the crock pot earlier. Whatever it is ... it makes my stomach rumble like Buddha when she gets near him. My mother equates a rumbling stomach with nuclear winter and acts like I've sliced my throat in front of her when she hears it and I gladly let her give me the third degree so that she will not start complimenting throw rugs, placemats, or possibly the ugly sculpture Erica uses for an umbrella stand. If I do move in ... that fucking Dalmatian has GOT to go.

Jazz takes to new places pretty easily. He's very well mannered and won't touch anything unless he's invited. Of course ... he'll let you know he wants to touch something by standing in one spot and staring at it with his hands out like he's trying to teleport whatever it is, but he doesn't need a babysitter. Nothing holds his attention in the living room, however, and he follows Erica into the kitchen. I hear her talking to him and point down the hall, motioning for my parents to follow me. I show them their room and the one that Jazz will be staying in. I set up his new mural lamp and turn the cover down for him so it can feel a little like home to him. My mom sits on the foot of the bed and my dad stands beside her with his hand on her shoulder. Oh god ... here it comes.

"Is it okay if we -" my dad begins, then trails off. I see his fingers tighten on mom's shoulder and she looks down at the hem of her shirt. "Are we allowed to ask things, Callie? About this -- about your life?"

"Yeah, sure. Doesn't mean I'll answer, but that's not really new." I smile at him. "What do you want to know?"

"Are you living here, honey?" Mom asks softly.

"Not really. No. I - I'm staying with a friend a couple of blocks from the hospital, but ... well ... truthfully I've been here more than there. And Erica keeps asking me to move in, but I keep saying no." I sit down and pull the pillow into my lap, smoothing imaginary wrinkles from it. "I'm not rushing anything. I'm going to do this right."

"It's a nice place. She's ... nice." That's the best my mother can do and about the best I could hope for. "Prettier than I remembered."

I watch as she pulls at a thread on her shirt and my heart breaks just a little. Her hair is gray at the roots and I think maybe she's been spending more time worrying about me than she has about her appearance and that's saying something. She may not care if she carries around too much weight, but her hair and face always take top priority over just about anything. "I know this is hard for you, Mom. I really appreciate that you're trying. It means a lot to me and to her."

"I've been talking to people. A group, actually, of other mothers who have children ... like you."

"Like me?"

"She's talking about PFLAG and what she means to say is that she has met several other mothers with gay or lesbian children." Dad rubs her back reassuringly. "She's doing a great job."

"You went to a PFLAG meeting?" I gasp. "Daaaamn."

She nods. "Your ... uhm ... how am I supposed to refer to her? Girlfriend? Partner?"

"Erica," I reply. "Just call her Erica."

"Right." Mom takes a deep breath. "Erica ... was frantic on the phone. I've threatened a lot of people in my day, but she really takes the cake. I've never heard anyone be so ... imaginative ... when telling a fireman what he could do with his axe."

For some reason, that warms me all over. And explains so much. No one really told me anything, but when the firemen came in to apologize to me for the wait ... they looked at her. Actually, at one point during their speech ... she got to her feet to refill my water and two of them backed up like she was going to run through them to get to the sink. "That's actually kinda romantic."

My mom makes a face. "It was terrifying. Not romantic. She's ... er ... creative. And possibly a big fan of horror films."

"She's actually not. She's a big chicken who doesn't like to watch anything scary. She has 'Fried Green Tomatoes' in her DVD player more often than not."

Dad grins at me. "The book was better. Ruth and Idgie were lovers in it."

Lori Anne Torres turns bright red. "That's,er, nice."

I laugh and my belly rumbles again. To keep from giving my mother a fit of apoplexy, I get to my feet and say, "Dinner should be ready soon. I'm gonna go see if I can help. The bathroom is the door at the end of the hall and -"

"What should we talk about at dinner?" Mom interrupts. "Where are her parents? Does she -"

"Don't grill her. Her parents are dead and she doesn't have fond memories of them."

"Okay."

"And don't give her the third degree about anything else. Dad, I'm looking at you. You terrorized George like you were in the Mafia and he was about to be kneecapped. He was scared shitless."

"I didn't like him," Dad replies. "I like her."

I leave them to their unpacking and head back down the hallway. When I get into the kitchen, I gasp and nearly freak out. Jazz is sitting at the island with an open container of butter and is smearing it all over the place. Erica has her back to him, stirring the contents of the crock pot intently. As I watch, Jasper dips a spoon into the Country Crock and lifts a roll, meticulously painting it with enough butter to deep fry it. "He, uh, doesn't know how to do that."

Erica turns and looks at him, picking up a dishtowel. She takes his hand and wipes it clean, then rakes most of the butter off the roll and back onto his spoon before she holds it out to him. "Good job, buddy. Put this on another one."

"Lee!" Jasper says, holding up the spoon. "I cook!"

No one has ever offered to let him help in the kitchen as far as I know. My mother views it as such sacred territory that we all know to tread lightly. Jazz usually stops just inside the doorway to announce that he wants juice, but doesn't go inside. I know the feeling because my mother will kick me out of the kitchen faster than I can ask to help her. Jasper has butter on his eye and the tip of his nose, but he's so proud of himself that I can't say a single thing except, "I see that."

"I help Yellow."

Erica uses the towel on his face and gives him a sweet smile. "You're a big help and you can do anything. Anything."

"Big help," he parrots. "I cook. Anything."

I suddenly feel very, very small for saying that he didn't know how to do something. My brother is, after all, a super hero. I give him a kiss on the head and watch him slowly turn the bread in his hand to make sure that the entire top is coated. People take so much for granted. The ability to butter a roll is usually a task that no one wants and they rush through it. As he works ... it's everything to him. I want to ask her how many times she showed him how to do it, but I don't. Instead, I peer over her shoulder into the crock pot. Whatever it is looks really, really good and the smell is making my mouth water. "Erica?"

"Callie?"

"Are you okay?"

"Did you talk to your parents about the clinical trial yet?"

"No."

"Are you going to?"

"Absolutely."

She looks from me to Jasper. "I think we should look into it more before you mention it to them. It's just my opinion, but we don't know the actual morbidity rate and when I see him sitting here in front of me ... I can see that he's not broken and cracking his head open for a maybe doesn't really make sense to me."

Before I can reply, my parents join us. When my mother starts to say something about the butter, I shake my head at her. Jazz proudly wields his spoon like a sword in front of him so that everyone can see that he's doing something new and then painstakingly sets the last roll on the baking sheet. He has lined them up perfectly, three rows of drenched, but meticulously arranged rolls and I watch him get to his feet and put the spoon in the sink and run water over it. "Thank you, Jasper," Erica says.

He smiles at her and rubs his buttery hands on his shorts. "Eat now?"

"Not yet. Very soon. You hungry?" she asks.

"Hungry." He goes into the dining room and sits down. My father follows him and I can hear him telling Jazz that he's a chef in the making.

The beef stew that Erica cooked is a huge success and the rolls turn out just fine. My nerves are a little on edge at first, but conversation is light and fun. My dad jokes about his manly scar from heart surgery and my mother tells us that she's caught him doing body builder poses in the mirror on more than one occasion. By the time we enjoy fresh fruit cocktail, my mother has changed gears and rattled off several of my most embarrassing and mortifying adolescent maladies. Erica tries hard not to laugh, but she finally gives up when Mom paints a truly Oscar worthy mental picture of taking me to the zoo when I was four years old and me biting some random woman on the ass because I was a 'crocodile'. My mother is an amazing storyteller and she adds to the tale every time she has an audience, but the end is still the same. The woman that I bit threw her hands in the air, prayed for Jesus, prayed for rain, prayed for deliverance, then yelled in tongues, and finally fainted. When she eventually came to ... she was convinced that one of the snakes from the reptile exhibit had gotten loose and sank its fiery fangs of death into her left butt cheek. To prove that she had indeed been attacked by a King Cobra and her rather large backside had indeed been necrotized by venom, she dropped her pants and pointed out the bruise. It's not my fault. I was just a kid. When I bit her the second time ... I was pretending to be a 'Snattle Rake'.

Erica has tears of joy rolling down her face when my mother says, "I was so mortified that I pretended I was her babysitter. To this day ... I tell everyone that she went into the zoo as a lovely little girl and came out as a jackass. Going around biting people, acting like she was raised by wolves. Honestly, Calliope, I could spank you for that right now! I tried to take you back four years later and they must have had your picture tacked in the security office because they gave us an escort."

Nearly howling with laughter now, Erica wheezes, "Did she - did she actually - call herself a 'Snattle Rake'?"

"Yes." My mom shakes her head sadly. "She couldn't say Rattle Snake. The Rattle Headed Copper Moccasin came later."

"The what?" Erica asks.

"Mother, don't you DARE!" When she winks at me prettily, I lay my head on the table. "I'm sick. I should go to bed."

"If you're sick my ass is a bouquet," Mom replies. "Now sit up and let me hear you NOT be able to defend this."

"This should be good." Erica takes my hand under the table. I don't care what my mother says at this point. I think my Mom can see our hands because she fills her wine glass and looks straight ahead, lost in obvious thought.

"Calliope has always had a fondness for reptiles," my dad begins, when my mother doesn't.

"No, Dad! Come back from the dark side! Don't help her humiliate me!" I plead with my eyes to no avail.

He plows straight ahead. "When she was about eight or nine, her science teacher had a green tree python in the classroom. It was huge ... about six feet of lime green ugly. Callie was fascinated with the thing and volunteered to bring it home with her during spring break. Now, we had a housekeeper at the time named Francesca and Franny, as we called her, was terrified of anything that crawled, slithered, flew, or just ... sat there. If it wasn't human ... and she saw it ... all you would see was the back of her head and her elbows pumping like mad as she went running."

My mother chuckles, pulled from shock by the promise of humiliation, and nods. "And like any kid does when it scents fear ... my little hellions would put jars of spiders or whatever else they could find all over the place. One year, jellyfish washed up all over the beach and Joel took Callie down with nets and they scooped 'em up and filled the bathtub with them. Franny had to get on Prozac after that and it's a good thing she was still on it when Callie brought that damn snake home."

"Callie made the decision that she was keeping that snake," says Dad. "We have a nice big pond in the backyard which I'm sure you saw, Erica," he pauses and she nods at him. "Well, my beautiful daughter knew that anyone who saw a lime green snake in a pond would know that it was not poisonous so what did she do? She opened up her reptile book and painted that damn python to match the poisonous breeds. ALL the poisonous breeds. She put triangles and diamonds all over it and then rainbow colored rings around its tails and let it dry in the sun. Franny was out there feeding the damn goldfish a few days later and realized that most of them were missing. All she saw was a snake with mutated markings and she threw her hands in the air and nearly drowned herself in the ocean."

My mom picks up without a beat. "I heard her screaming and ran out on the terrace. She couldn't speak much English. Franny was Italian and the only thing I understood was 'snake'. I grabbed a shovel so that I could behead it and Callie came racing around me screaming that it was a 'Rattle Headed Copper Mocassin' and if I got close to it ... it would kill me by spitting venom all over me. She raced to the pond and tried to throw herself into the water, but at that point ... I had seen something up under the water that was huge. I had to hold her down as I screamed for Franny to call 911 and poor Franny believed Callie that it was a 'Rattle Headed Copper Mocassin' and tried to relay that to the dispatcher. When animal control got there ... that damn snake had its head poked up out of the water and it looked like a damn Sprite can that been dropped in the mud and they debated for ten minutes about what the hell it was before one of them went in to get it. I've never seen grown men laugh until one of them wets their pants, but that's exactly what one of them did when they realized that Callie had tarted that snake up like a two bit whore to camouflage it. There was orange, brown, red, gold, and my favorite, hot pink. She had put hot pink lips on the thing thinking that would make it more menacing."

Erica looks like she wants to pee in her pants. She's holding her stomach as she laughs and she's still got a death grip on my hand. "So what happened next?" she wheezes.

"In a fit of absolute insanity," Mom says, "the child yanked her pants down and showed everyone her ass like the woman had done at the zoo. There wasn't a mark on it, but she was yelling for snake to 'run' while she mooned God and country."

"Oh my GOD!" cries Erica, fanning at her face. "What happened to the snake?"

"They took the damn thing back to my teacher." I work up a really good scowl. "And when it shed its skin finally ... she put it in a big glass case so that everyone could see that I was a Picasso in the making."

"And wrote a note in your file that you were a menace to society," Mom says. "Life was very interesting with you, pumpkin."

Jasper suddenly yawns. It's loud and if it was anyone else ... it would be a not so subtle implication that it was time for the chatter to come to an end. With him ... he's genuinely exhausted. I watch him rub his eyes and stretch, then he catches me looking and grins at me. That's Jasper. Being tired doesn't change how willing his smile is. He can be in obvious pain, but still smile through it because he loves us and seeing us is enough to make him forget that anything in the world is wrong. He doesn't complain and even if he could ... I don't believe he would. Locked in his world, small things matter. Maybe the confinement of his limitations makes what he can do, and he CAN smile, seem that much greater. So he puts those small accomplishments on repeat and doesn't let them get turned off like so many other things. His smile is a guarantee.

Erica's wrong.

Cracking into his head for a maybe is better than an absolutely not.

I don't mention the clinical trial, though.

Mom says that she needs to put Jazz to bed and I offer to do it for her. I leave my parents helping Erica clear the table and take Jazz down the hall. He brushes his teeth just barely so I do it for him. We wash his face and then I help him into his pajamas and watch him kneel beside the bed. He looks at me curiously when I don't join him. "You talk God, Lee."

I kneel down next to him, but I don't clasp my hands together. "Jasper?"

His eyes are closed and his fingers are laced under his chin. "Dear God -"

"Jasper, look at me."

His eyes are lighter than mine. There are flecks of gold in the brown and they're wide when he focuses on me. "You pray, Lee?"

"Are you happy like this? Do you remember the things you used to do? Do you miss it?"

"Miss it."

He's not answering me. He can't answer me. He's mimicking the fragments of my words that he picks up on. "I wish you could tell me what you want to do."

"Daw-phin!" Unclasping his hands, he points at his lamp. "Sleep."

"What if I could make you catch up?"

"Ketchup. Hot dog. Fries!"

It's no use. He can't help me. I put my hands together and watch him follow suit. "Dear God."

"Dear God."

"Thank you for family."

"Family.

"Thank you for health."

"Heff."

"Thank you for love."

"Thanks love."

"And let me know what to do."

"Know do."

"Amen."

"Amen, Lee!" He squeezes me hard in a hug, then lunges under the cover and pulls them up to his chin, pointing with excitement at the ceiling.

I laugh and turn the new lamp on. It's not just blue. There are greens and yellows and reds mixed with the dolphin blue and he sits up, staring at the prisms of color that float all over the ceiling and walls. He spots a dolphin and whispers something, then eases back against the pillow. I think the colors jarred him the same way that they jarred me when I started to walk in rainbows. It takes a second, but his hand comes up and he holds it, unmoving and palm up, like he's waiting to be pulled into the carousel. Maybe, in his mind, he already is and they take him into a dream world where he's whole. Those mural animals are just like him ... they're forever doomed to ride in a circle, around and around ... until the bulb goes out or the lamp breaks.

What if ...

What if I could open the window and they could streak into the night and find the ocean.

What if ... I could open the window in Jazz's brain?

Would he streak into the ocean or charge into tomorrow?

Would he thank me?

My parents say goodnight when I close Jasper's door behind me. I can see that my mother is struggling with morbid curiosity. She wants to linger in the hallway and see if I go into Erica's bedroom with her. I know she counted the doors as I showed them their rooms and I know that she probably wants to see it in order to believe it, but my dad asks her where she put his toothbrush and she disappears behind the door. He kisses me on the head and follows her without another word. Erica clears her throat and says, "There's a pull out bed in the den. I could sleep there if you -"

"No." I go into her bedroom and wait for her to join me. It's her house and she looks nervous, like she's doing something wrong. Smiling, I pull my shirt off and kick my shoes across the room. I hit her in the chest with my bra and she's on me before I can push my pants down. She does it herself, kissing my belly as she exposes it, exhaling against my flesh until it's dotted with goose bumps. I wiggle my hips as my pants clear them and she nips at curviest part, whispering, "Snattle Rake."

"Not. Funny."

"Pretty damn funny." She bites me again and throws my pants toward the hamper. Her palm runs up the inside of my thigh, causing me to bite my bottom lip. "You're so beautiful, Cal. So damn beautiful."

I've never really been a fan of blond hair, but I've never seen anything prettier than her pale locks brushing against my caramel skin as she kisses her way up my stomach and closes her mouth around one of my nipples. I dig my fingers into that hair and pull her mouth to mine, kissing her the way I've wanted to for hours. I feel her hands on my ass, kneading, squeezing, and I say her name. It's an invitation ... an invitation that stops just short of begging. She rubs my waist, then moves to my shoulders and says, "You're tense."

"You do remember the day I've had, right?"

"Want a massage?"

"I'm already seduced, Yellow."

"Get on the bed, freak," she says, swatting my backside. "I can't believe you mooned animal control."

"Stop. Talking."

I stretch out on my stomach and watch over my shoulder as she takes her clothes off. The blue panties are back and as much as I love seeing her naked ... I tell her to leave them on and turn around so I can get the big picture. She has a really, really nice ass. There are two dimples at the base of her spine and I've kissed them several times and want to do that now, but she shakes her head and joins me on the bed, still in her panties, before I can. She straddles my thighs and massages my shoulders, digging her thumbs into my tight muscles until I jerk from the pain. "Ow!"

"We have to do this the quiet way, baby, because you're mother saw the shovel in my garage and I don't want her to get any ideas."

She hits another sore spot and I say, "Massage less and kiss more."

Eventually, she complies and shifts her weight off my legs to move between them. Her fingertips rake over my ass, causing me to lift up a little and she seizes the moment, sliding her hand against my center. She doesn't touch my clit, she eases one long finger into me as she kisses the small of my back. This gentle teasing? It hurts worse than the deep tissue massage. I strain against her finger, pushing back against it to show that I want more, but she doesn't give in. Her tongue tastes my back, her hair tickles my hip, but still ... she doesn't do more. I'm going to have to give her a hand. I push myself to my knees and she says, "Touch yourself."

"I was planning on it." I've never been a self pleasure junkie, but I don't mind helping out. One hand closes over my hip as she adds another finger. I get what she's doing. Kneeling behind me, this is our very own doggie-style. I ease forward and slam back against her hand and thighs as we find a rhythm. I feel like I can't breathe at all when the hand on my hip moves to my hair and she pulls me up, making my back arch like a bow. She kisses me over my shoulder as I get off and changes the angle of her fingers to thump against my g-spot. I want to scream as fresh tremors rock through me, but she keeps her mouth on mine so that she's the only one who can hear my pleasure. When I pull away and slump down on my stomach again, she laughs and covers my body with hers. "Dirty masturbator."

"You helped!" I roll onto my back and she stays on top of me, leaning down to kiss me.

Those fucking blue panties are going to be the death of me. I grip her ass in both hands, feeling the lacy fabric as my tongue moves against hers. I have felt lacy panties on my own ass a million times and it has never, ever felt the way it does against hers. I trace the pattern as I move to her ear, sucking at her lobe, then the spot just behind it that makes her crazy. When I move to her neck, she sits up on me and says, "This slow thing ... Callie, it has to stop. I want -"

I cup her breasts in my palms and flick her nipples with my thumb. "What do you want, Erica?"

"You."

"You've got that. What else do you want?"

She leans down and I think she's going to kiss me again, but she traces my lips with her tongue instead. "Shove me onto my back, take these panties off me and after you throw them across the room, I want you to put your very, very pretty mouth to good use. I want you to taste exactly what you do to me and when you make me come ... I want you to do it again only that time ... I'm gonna be doing the same thing to you."

Erica Hahn, for the record, gets what she wants.

Repeatedly.

Buddha has forsaken me.

It could possibly be the fact that I forgot about him until three in the morning. It's not like he doesn't have a dog house outside! When I open the back door, he sits there looking at me with unadulterated rage and then prances past me, his head high and his tail curved over his back. I follow him to the bedroom and pat the bed, hoping he will join me, but he goes to his cushion, tosses a toy off of it, and slumps down, glaring at me. I swear the little guy sighs with indignation. I snuggle back into Erica's embrace and fall asleep listening to him snore. When I wake up, he's whimpering and sniffing and scratching. I push myself up on my elbow and start to say his name, but Erica puts a hand over my mouth, then points. As I watch, a long finger moves under the door and Buddha licks it, pressing his head against it. I hear my brother laugh and feel Erica doing the same behind me.

"How long has he been out there?" I ask.

"I woke up about five minutes ago."

"If I open the door ... do you think Buddha will bite him?"

"That little fucker would bite the Virgin Mary, but he hasn't even growled at him."

I push the cover off and reach for the knob, but she grabs me and pulls me back into the bed. "What are you -"

"You're naked."

"Oh!" I give her a kiss and rub my nose against hers. "Wanna let me borrow you robe?"

"You can have my robe."

"Sweet!" I pluck it off the foot of the bed and slip my arms into it, then watch her pad into the bathroom in all her naked glory before I open the door and let Buddha greet Jazz.

Buddha has definitely forsaken me.

My brother has very minimal dealings with dogs. Mom thinks that they are worthless flea bags and my father is not signing up for PETA anytime soon so Jasper doesn't quite know what to make of the red bundle of energy and ear splitting barks. For a second, he looks scared, then Buddha leaps into his lap and attacks his face with slobbery kisses and Jasper laughs harder than I've heard in my life. He practically screams with laughter and when he handles Buddha, it's gentle and not clumsy in the least. He closes his arms around him and strokes his fur and that damn dog eats it up, burrowing against his chest like he isn't a miniaturized version of Freddy Krueger at times. I can almost see a crooked and slightly bent halo dangling off his pointy ears. "You suck up," I tell the dog, scratching his head. He lets me ... but he only has eyes for my brother.

Jazz is still in his pajamas and the door to my parent's room is still shut. "Wanna go outside, Jasper?"

"Outside!"

"Come on."

I open the back door and Jazz steps out into the morning air. He blinks a few times, taking in the view of the city, then the manicured yard and flowers. "Pretty!"

"Pretty," I agree. I know if I try to take the dog ... Jasper will cry and Buddha will sever my arm so I say, "Put him down and watch him run."

"Nooooo. Not down."

"He has to go potty."

Jasper considers that, then points into the yard. "Out there?!"

It's my turn to laugh because he says it the same way anyone who was faced with the prospect of pissing outside for the first time would. "Out there, buddy. Put him down. He'll come right back."

"Right back!"

Buddha races into the yard and waters a couple of plants before he darts behind the gazebo to do more sordid things. I can say this for him ... the dog has his pride. Jasper seems worried when he can't see him anymore and slowly lumbers down the stairs. I watch as he walks barefoot through the grass, leaning down to run his fingers over it. Hey, to kids with a beach for a yard, grass is something else! This really is the kind of yard that would benefit from a swing set and the laughter of children echoing off the surrounding hills. Jasper's laughter when Buddha races toward him, hopping through the grass as if the morning dew is hurting him, sounds like music. As Jazz chases after the dog and the dog chases Jazz ... I realize that I've never seen my brother run quite so well. There's no limp that I can see and I wonder if Buddha chewed through a couple of Jazz's chains when I wasn't looking.

I'm still enjoying their antics when Erica joins me. I wrap my arms around her waist and lean my head against hers. We look out at Jazz together, laughing when he falls and Buddha rolls with him, flopping onto his back beside his new friend. I hear the door behind us slide open and Erica stiffens and starts to move away, but I don't let her. There are few moments in life worth hanging onto ... I tighten my grip on this moment and when I tell my mother good morning, I keep my arm around my girlfriend's waist and give her a kiss before I offer to cook breakfast. My mother unites with Erica is a chorus of 'No, no, I can do it' and they laugh at my expense. I never claimed to be a cook. My dad comes out in time for Buddha to latch onto his sock and tug playfully.

Whatever uncomfortable moment I was braced for doesn't come.

Unless you count my dad's glaring white legs blinding us in the morning sun.

My parents stay another night and Erica winds up calling into work both days. She doesn't lie to Chief Webber, really, but she also doesn't tell him that she's not sick. She lets him assume that she is and we sleep in the day that my parents are flying home. When I wake up, she's got one of Buddha's toys in her hand and she's staring at it. The dog has been sleeping with Jazz. The previous night, my brother didn't ask for his dolphin light ... he asked for 'Booty' and curled up on his side with Buddha under the cover next to him. My mother has also shocked me to death by taking a liking to the Pomeranian. She baby talks at him and cooked, actually COOKED, two slices of bacon for him. As for my dad ... he tolerates the licking and the nuzzling well enough ... but doesn't say much. I did catch him throwing a ball like a very well trained man the previous night, though.

"What are you doing?" I finally ask sleepily, watching her run her thumb over a rope knot.

"I hate that dog."

Something in her voice worries me and when I look at her face, I can see dried tears on her cheeks. "Erica, wha-"

"I wanted a cat. If we had to have and animal running around the house ... I wanted a cat. One of those ugly hairless kinds that can't shed and look like a little old man so people understand why you don't like it because it's just too damn ugly to deserve affection. Rachel saw Buddha in the window of a pet shop and even though we said that we were going to go the rescue route ... she looked at his fat little belly and named his Buddha before she ever even held him. I begged her not to buy him, but she couldn't say no to him. And I couldn't say no to her."

I watch her eyes fill with tears again and kiss her cheek. "What's -"

"I kept him because she asked me to take care of him, but I don't know how to do that. I look at him and I see her and maybe I even resent her because out of all the dogs in the world ... she chose an ugly, red, Devil-ass and expected me to love it. I don't. I don't love him at all, but ... he loves Jasper." She tosses the toy across the room and runs a hand through her hair. "I think - I think maybe Rachel would understand if I gave him to your brother. Seeing Jasper smile when that damn ball of fur acts like a fool would have made her day. So ... if your parents think it's okay then we'll get his crate ready and let him go ... home."

She sniffles and when she rolls into my arms it's a little unexpected. I'm always the one in hers. I kiss the top of her head and rub her back. "You don't hate the dog, Yellow."

"Yes, I do."

"No, you don't."

"I despise him. I should buy a BB gun and shoot him once a day to make myself feel better."

"You're so full of shit."

"I'd drop kick his ass for a dollar."

"And then you'd walk through fire to make sure he was okay."

She looks up at me, a frown line on her forehead. "Is it that obvious?"

"It is." I nod at her and rub a tear from under her eye. She looks like she's been awake for hours worrying. "I never met Rachel ... but the way you love her tells me all I need to know about her. I think she was amazing and I think that whatever you want to do with the dog ... she'd be proud ... of ... well, your restraint if nothing else. You may secretly love the dog, Erica, but I don't think he feels the same way. Your ankles will never be the same."

"You know what I think?" She reaches up and touches my chin, then my cheek. "I think that you're amazing and you're everything Rachel wanted for me. Before she died ... she made me promise her that I'd fall in love again, that I'd share my life with another woman and not hold back. I told her that when she got to Heaven she needed to send me somebody good and she reminded me that I didn't believe in heaven. I guess ... now ... I ... have to."

I can't grin big enough. "I love our morning chats."

"I love you."

"I love you more."

"No way." She laughs and rubs her face. "Think your parents will take the little bastard?"

"My mother mentioned getting Jasper a dog last night. I've never seen him so ... different. He talks more to that dog than he has ever talked to me." I tighten my grip on her. "It's weird ... it's like Buddha is speaking to a part of his brain that we can't. I need to talk to my parents about that damn surgery. It could -"

"Change him."

"Yep. It could change everything. He could ... be better."

She shakes her head, but doesn't say anything.

I don't know if it's because we can hear people moving around the house or because she's disgusted by my need to repair something she thinks is perfect the way it is.

Asking her about it proves to be an impossibility. I mentioned The Fremont Troll the previous night and Jazz has not forgotten it. We spend the few hours leading up to my family's flight letting him climb all over the legendary work of art and then he points at the Space Needle and Erica can't say no to us taking him to the top. My parents stay firmly on the ground and Jazz runs from window to window, looking out and pointing at what he can't put into words. He's full of wonder and excitement and still has that sense of magic about him that we're all born with. You know the kind ... where you believe in Santa Claus and The Tooth Fairy and that the Easter Bunny hops through your house leaving eggs and baskets. Losing that sense of magic ... kills the last spark of childhood in everyone. If I steal that from Jazz with a scalpel ... I may regret it for the rest of my life.

But if I don't try ... what will his life be like?

My parents won't live forever and right now ... Joel is the one who will take guardianship of Jasper when they die.

Would I wish that on anyone?

What if Jazz could be his own man and not depend on anyone but himself?

We stop by Erica's house before the airport. Buddha's crate is on her bed and she's packed all of his toys and dog treats into a blue carrying case that has a red Pomeranian on the side. She told me when she packed it that Rachel had spent hours quilting the bag and that Buddha was so small inside it that it was laughable. He never did grow into it and now his life is packed into it ... stuffing it to the gills. The presence of the traveling crate makes the little dog shiver and try to hide under the bed. Usually, when that crate is used ... it means the Vet. I catch him before he can hide and he starts to cry when I kiss him. He doesn't go easy, but any dog that's spent any time with Erica Hahn would learn a thing or two about putting up a good fight. He scratches the blood out of me by the time that I lock the door and Erica kneels down, looking at him.

"He doesn't like being locked up in this one. The other crate doesn't bother him, but he hates this one," she says. "How long is the flight again?"

"He'll be fine," I tell her. "My parents are going to try to get him in first class with them as a service animal for Jazz."

As I watch, Buddha whimpers again and puts his paw through the wire door.

Erica takes it in her hand and pets it.

He lets her.

They both tremble a little.

The hardest goodbyes are the ones with no words ... when you look at each other and accept that you weren't the right fit and let your eyes say that there are no hard feelings. It's even harder to let go and when she picks up the crate and walks into the hall with it, my dad takes it and makes kissy sounds at Buddha. There's no more whining. He spins on the spot and yips playfully at my dad and I'm pretty sure that a certain man who makes muscle poses in the mirror is going to find himself throwing a ball on the beach and picking out chew toys like a good servant should. At the airport, my mother pitches a big enough tantrum that Buddha is not only allowed in first class ... he gets his own seat. Erica hands my mother the leash that she has hidden in her pocket, mumbling something about having a safe flight, and my mother takes her face in her hands. "Thank you for giving him to Jasper," Mom says.

"You're welcome," Erica replies, looking shocked when my mother kisses both of her cheeks.

"I think we're going to get along just fine, Erica," she tells her. For my mother ... that's the equivalent of offering someone a lung. "You take care of my girl and I'll take care of your dog,"

"I'm way more valuable than a dog!" I pretend to be outraged, but I'm actually pretty fucking touched by the exchange.

Erica is, too.

Until we're walking across the parking lot hand in hand.

She stops suddenly, scaring me. "What's wrong?"

"I've doomed Buddha to clogged arteries and table scraps!"

"Lucky bastard," I reply. "Speaking of clogged arteries ... wanna stop at Kentucky Fried Chicken?"

"No, I don't and neither do you."

"I'm pretty sure I want Popcorn Chicken drenched in honey mustard with mac and cheese and cole slaw on the side. Oooooh, and a fluffy biscuit drenched in honey."

"Do you know how many calories that is? How much fat and ... badness?"

"With that many calories in my system ... I probably won't want to sleep. I'll be like the Energizer Bunny and keep going and going and going ..."

"Hmm, that's a very good point. I'll buy."

I don't have a choice.

I'm out of clean clothing.

I have to go 'home' and it's very, very hard to think of Cristina's apartment as home after being so welcome in Erica's, but I said I wasn't moving in yet and I guess I need to stick to my guns. What Erica and I have right now is perfect and uncomplicated and wonderful. At least that's what I tell myself. There's no real reason for me not to move in. Unless you count my fear of everything changing. What if she notices that I have a tendency to shed all over the bathroom floor? What if she gets tired of stepping over my shoes because I kick them off all over the place and what if she gets tired of me leaving the cap off the toothpaste? Maybe she will hate the fact that I leave my laundry in a basket for the most part or get annoyed that I like to put books in the bathroom because I get bored easily just sitting there. What if she doesn't want my Gameboy on the nightstand or my laptop charging on the sofa. Maybe she won't appreciate the way I doodle all over the mail or hang my bras over the shower rail after I hand wash them.

Maybe my bad habits will turn her off.

I mean, it's hard to romance someone when you pick their dirty underwear up off the floor a few times.

Izzie and Meredith are sitting on my bed when I open the door. Meredith throws up a hand to greet me. Izzie just looks pissed that I exist at all. I see her lip curl and I wonder briefly what it would feel like to punch her so hard that the only thing capable of curling is her toes. And not in a good, sexy way ... in an 'oh my god I'm not going to be able to suck a straw for three weeks' kind of way. That particular houseguest calls for beer and I drop my purse into the chair and grab one from the fridge. I twist the lid off, toss it into the trash and take several pulls from the bottle. There are empty take out containers all over the counter and enough empty bottles on the table to make me think I missed one hell of party. "Where's Cristina?"

Meredith points toward the bedroom and I knock twice before I push the door open. Cristina is tying her running shoes and when she looks at me, I see something there that I can't quite place. "Hey," I say.

"How's your girlfriend?"

"She's good. I need to talk to you." I shift from one foot to the other when she doesn't say anything. Shutting the door behind me, I choose my words carefully. "I'm not trying to start anything and -"

"If you're about to tell me that you don't want Izzie here then save it. I don't want Hahn here, either."

"Wh- no... it's not that. I - I need you to stop throwing Burke in Erica's face. She hates him and you know that it's -"

"Okay, where have you been for the past few months? Because I've been on the receiving end of more abuse from her than -"

"As a favor to me ... can you please -"

"As a favor to you? Okay, I'm not trying to start anything, but this is where I tell you that you haven't done me any favors lately. The only reason I got to scrub in with her the other day is because I blackmailed her. You didn't help me. You didn't say one word when she was putting me down or making me feel like I didn't belong here ... in my apartment. You just sat there again and again so don't come in here and tell me what I need to stop doing. Go tell her that she needs to start teaching!"

"I'm not doing that, Cristina! I'm not running interference or -"

"What the hell are you doing right now?" She puts her hands on her hips. "All I have done is kiss her ass and I don't have anything to show for it except a few pity throws from my friends who give up their surgeries so that I can scrub in. I'm the one who wants Cardio and Stevens keeps getting it. Stevens!"

"I can't make her teach you!"

"No, but you can tell her to stop treating me like shit! I let you live here! I came to the Archfield and stopped you from drinking yourself to death. I've even done the girl thing and let you cry on my shoulder. I've been a good friend to you and I'm still waiting for you to return the favor."

"I'm not her keeper!"

"Tell her to be professional, Torres!"

"Oh, like you were when you were blackmailing her!?"

"Fuck you."

I don't speak at all when she brushes past me and yanks the door open. I watch out of the corner of my eye as she grabs her keys and Meredith and Izzie follow her out. Izzie doesn't say a word, but Meredith gives me an uncomfortable, "See ya, Cal."

It takes me less than an hour to pack.

I leave a check for enough to cover my part of the rent for three months. That will give Cristina time to get a new roommate if that's what she wants.

When I've got my SUV packed to the gills, I laugh at the irony of it all.

I could write a check for a house and not have to worry about being frequently homeless.

I could point my car in the direction of Erica's house and she would welcome me with open arms, too.

What I do ... is drive to the Archfield and circle the parking deck three times before a space becomes available. I've never seen it so crowded and when the receptionist tells me that there are no available rooms ... I actually entertain the idea that Rachel, from her spot in Heaven, is trying to send me a message. If I spend all my time running from the domestic dream just because a couple of those dreams weren't that great ... what will that leave me? Erica wants me to move in. I want to move in.

But ... I'm not ready.

And I don't want to turn up on her doorstep just because I'm homeless. I did that with George and to an extent ... I did it with Mark.

"Hey, what are you doing here?"

I turn around and smile with relief when I see Addison. Sometimes it's just a great feeling to see a familiar face when you least expect it. "Roommate issues."

"Erica or Cristina?"

"Cristina. And how in the hell is this place booked? I guess I'll go see if the Econo Lodge has a vacancy."

Addison grins. "I'm in a double room and getting drunk alone again does nothing for me. Wanna?"

"I'm in."

"Come on."

For what it's worth ... I do falter. I do stop for a second and think about ramifications. I think about hurting Erica's feelings by NOT going to her place and opting to stay in a hotel, but I've also made it crystal clear that moving in with her is not at the top of my 'to do' list right now. I want to enjoy dating her and spending some nights with her because I do believe that not rushing will make us stronger. What's at the top of my 'to do' list right now ... is talking to another doctor about the clinical trial that Jasper could benefit from. Addison has met him. Addison sees his limitations and when I explain the procedure, she asks me plenty of questions. Being married to Derek has given her a firm grasp on neurology and she tells me about a few of the big cases that Derek worked on in New York. She assures me that he's the right person for the job and promises me that she will start talking to him about it the following day.

We raid the wet bar in her, no ... our room and order a movie off pay per view, but we wind up talking more than watching it so she turns it off and curls up on her bed, facing me on mine. "Mark's mad at me," she finally admits.

"Why?"

"I wouldn't sleep with him." With a sigh, she rearranges the pillow under her head, punching it a couple of time. I bet she is seeing his face. "I'm not going to be the rebound."

"Can you be a rebound if you were there first?"

"He's making me feel like one."

There have never really been uncomfortable silences with me and Addison. We can talk about anything and nothing and just enjoy each other's company. It's an unlikely friendship ... it always has been ... but it works. The silence that hangs between us, though, is shaped like Mark Sloan and it's heavier than a wool coat in June. I didn't just hurt him, I hurt her, too, by being who she couldn't be. All I can say is, "I'm sorry."

"I'm going to eventually pick up his pieces. I'm going to make him see me again," she says. "Is that okay with you?"

"Addy, if anyone has a shot in Hell of picking up any part of him ... it's you."

"If we're going to be roommates, you have to promise me that I won't walk in on hot lesbian loving. Hang a sock on the doorknob or something."

"Well, I don't want to walk in on you and Mark making the two backed beast so you hang a sock, too."

"Two backed beast?" she snorts.

"Do you have a better name for it?"

"Bashing the beaver?"

"Ewww, that makes mine hurt. How about mattress dancing?"

"You've seen me dance, Callie. It's not pretty. Bumpin' uglies?"

"Wettin' the wick."

"I got it," she says. "Hot dog in the jungle."

"Yuck! If you've got a jungle you need to wax!"

She laughs and pulls the cover over herself. "I think I've got a buzz."

"I do, too." I finish off the bottle of cognac and snuggle under my own comforter. "I'm glad you're home."

"I'm glad you're here," she replies. "I was gearing myself up for a night of crying, misery, and self flagellation."

"If that's Addy-speak for shower head loving ... stop now."

"Callie?"

"Hmm?"

"You really do love her, huh?"

"I really, really love her."

What I don't love is the hangover I wake up with or the fact that I can't find my toothbrush.

That will turn out to be the least of my worries, though.


	12. Chapter 12

You know how you can tell you're going to have a bad day?

If the coffee you ordered at Starbucks goes into your lap because a certain redhead can't drive for shit and you tear your shirt because her convertible is the size of a fucking clown car and you get stuck getting out and then the dark sunglasses you're wearing do not prevent people from yelling ... that's how you know you're going to have a bad day. Hell, you already are. Addison is clearly as hung over as I am because she didn't bother with high fashion today. She's wearing sweat pants and a salmon colored scrub top that I would rib her about if a high school marching band wasn't playing 'I Wanna Be Sedated' with entirely too much bass in my head. We take one look at the elevator, then at each other, and make a beeline for the stairs. By the time we make it to the fourth floor, we're both moving like we've been beaten about the limbs with a crowbar and I duck into the resident's lounge while she heads down the hallway to the attending's. Changing into my scrubs is a trial of hit or miss. I actually put my shirt on backwards twice before George of all people takes pity on me and turns it around. When Stevens slams her locker ... it goes straight into my skull, bounces around, and then blows my ears off. I actually feel to see if they're still there.

When blessed silence descends and the last of the residents scurry off to cut an unsuspecting victim open ... I flop onto my stomach on the bench and try not to breathe too hard. Cognac is nasty, nasty Devil water and should be banned from shelves nationwide. If I had puked my guts up ... I'd feel better. I open one eye something brushes against my hand. Addison is standing in front of me holding a toothbrush and toothpaste. She's got her lab coat on and has combed the tangles out of her hair. Sorta. She kneels down beside me and says, "I brushed, flossed, and gargled with Listerine before work and someone still told me that I smell like a brewery."

"Is my head swollen?"

"No more than usual. Sit up. I brought you Tylenol."

It takes me about two minutes to urge my ailing carcass upright and I accept the pills and the cup of water. Popping them gags me and the water feels like a rope of bile in my throat, but I thank her anyway and go brush my teeth. When I finish, she's still sitting on the bench and she's got her head in her hands. I drop down beside her like I'm boneless and say, "Think we could call in sick?"

"I need to call in dead."

"We could claim post traumatic shock disorder."

"Or ... death. I'm knocking on heaven's door, Cal."

I pat her on the back. "Do you have surgery this morning?"

"No. I'm gonna go stake a claim on a death bed in the on call room. Wanna come with?"

"Can't." Standing up, I grab my white coat and slip it on. "I need to go do the rounds I haven't done in two days."

We walk into the hallway and she turns my collar down, shaking her head. "I'm never drinking again."

"Me either."

"Ever?"

"Ever."

She makes a face. "I'm probably lying."

"I'm definitely lying. Want to get a drink after work?" I laugh when she impulsively hugs me. "Alcohol makes you weird and touchy feely. I don't approve."

Squeezing my hand, she gives me a lopsided grin and heads toward the on call room.

Naturally ... when I turn around ... Erica is about five feet behind me looking like I just slapped her across the face. She opens the door to the conference room and nods inside. If I were on death row and about to be executed ... this would be the long walk. Those five feet that it takes to get to her feel like two miles of desert with a blazing sun ripping over the pus filled sunburn that I probably got the day before. Or possibly jabbing it with hot needles. She stands in the doorway and lets me enter first and I know that the toothbrush did nothing to remedy the stale scent of excessive cognac on my breath. To her credit, she doesn't slam the door, but she doesn't lightly close it either. It ricochets through me all the same and I groan, putting a hand to my head. I still have on my sunglasses and it's not helping. At all. Bright light! Call me Gizmo.

She puts her hands on her hips and paces the length of the room. This is her way of not saying something she will regret. She usually opens her mouth and lets whatever is stuck in her craw fly, but when she does the strut and the pause ... she's reigning in the tidal wave as best she can. I know this strut well ... I've just seldom been the cause. That I know of. I don't know which part is pissing her off. She could know that I moved out of Cristina's and didn't come to her place. Or ... she could know that and where I spent the night. I brace myself for either. Maybe she just has something against cognac.

When she finally does speak, her tone is eerily controlled. "I got called into Webber's office this morning to talk about your roommate."

Hello, left field. "Why would Addison -"

"Apparently she - wait - what?"

"Oh! Cristina!" My eyes widen and I push my glasses up on top of my head. "Is this about teaching her? Because she crawled my ass yesterday about it. Not about me and you ... but about you giving her a hard time. You know ... she's not so bad and Cardio is her thing so -"

"Back up ... why are you talking about Addison? And while we're on the subject of her ... why do the two of you look and smell like you've been licking the floor at Joe's?"

Hmmm ... to tell the truth or not to tell the truth?

"We had drinks last night."

"Obviously. Where were you when you had these infamous drinks?"

"At the Archfield."

"Did you drink and drive!?" Her voice rises. "Callie!"

"No."

Her head tilts. Oh god ... I know the head tilt. That's the outer bands of Hurricane Hahn hitting land. "You took a cab then?"

Fucking hell. "Uh ... no. You know how I just mentioned that Cristina crawled my ass? Well ... I moved out."

Her mouth drops open. "And went to the Archfield?!"

Jesus, when she says it like that I feel dirty. "It was really late and I didn't want to -"

"Don't." She holds up her hand. "You really don't want to move in with me do you? Hell, I don't know which is worse ... that you picked a couch over my bed ... or that you'd rather pay two thousand bucks a week than be with me."

"That's not true." I reach for her and my heart breaks when she pushes my hands away. "I told you I'm not ready."

"You know what I'm not ready for?"

Now my heart stops. "Erica, don't -"

"Nevermind," she snaps. "You're right. I'm not going to say anything else. You've said it all!"

I block the door when she starts to walk out. "Wait. Please?"

"For nearly a year ... I have waited! You have pushed and pulled me in every direction and if either one of us should not be ready for this, Callie, it's me. You have hurt me repeatedly and I'm still the one who keeps begging for more! When is it enough for you!?" She rakes her hands through her hair when I don't reply. "Move out of the way."

"It's not that I don't want to live with you. I do. I just think -"

"Move out of the way," she repeats. "Before this entire hospital hears me tell you what I think."

"Can you please -"

"MOVE!"

Her voice causes my brain to actually explode. Any second now I'll feel it dribbling out my ears. I grit my teeth and press my hands to my head while I wait for unconsciousness. It doesn't come. The only thing that does come is the finality of a slamming door and the fact that the conference room witnesses a truly magnificent breakdown on my part. I don't cry, but I do knock a chair over and kick the wall. Maybe that's not really magnificent when it comes to breakdowns ... but when your brain is mush and your body won't cooperate and chase after the woman you love ... it's the best you can do.

It just doesn't make me feel any better.

I finally throw up everything I have ever eaten after Addison pages me to the lunchroom. Neither one of us buy more than stiff coffee and we sit indoors as close to the air conditioner vent as possible. When Alex Karev decides to sit down at our table and show us the chewed up hot dog in his mouth and then tell us that it's made out of ears, asses, and eyeballs ... Addy and I nearly trample each other getting to the bathroom. I feel slightly better after my body turns itself inside out, but I still look like shit ... only redder for my efforts. Erica won't return my texts and her phone is going straight to voice mail so I stop calling after I leave four messages. I don't want to look desperate or anything. The fact that I left long enough messages to be cut off on each one couldn't possibly be considered desperate, right? I'm standing beside Addison brushing my teeth again when my pager goes off. Hers vibrates a moment later and we exchange looks.

Being paged to the Chief's office with your partner in crime is only comforting in that you're not alone.

The second we enter, Webber glares at us and says, "Sit down."

I don't look at Addison.

She doesn't look at me.

"I can see that the complaints about you were not unwarranted." He sits down in his leather chair and I feel like a wilting flower under his scrutiny. "What time did you two menaces lay off the bottle?"

"Early," Addison replies at the same time I say, "Late."

I watch her flinch out of the corner of my eye and involuntarily do the same. I better let her do the talking ... Richard likes her.

"Before or after midnight?"

I see her look at me and suddenly Webber's bookcase is the most engrossing thing I've ever seen. I can't stare at it hard enough and I try to count the books on the top shelf while I wait for her to say something. She finally clears her throat and says, "After."

"And what time did you have to report to work?"

Addison must be as absorbed in the bookcase as me because neither one of us can utter a sound.

Richard slams a heavy paperweight down on his desk and I nearly leap out of my skin. Actually, I'm pretty sure that I have a near death, out of body experience, and the light coming through the window is the white light of Heaven. I'm tempted to run into it, but I blurt out, "I was scheduled for six, but I didn't get here until eight," instead.

"So, you were late."

"Yes, sir."

His nostrils flare slightly. "Addison?"

"I was late, too."

"I see." He looks back at me. "Dr. Torres, are you going to make me regret going to bat for you over the Ambien fiasco?"

"No, sir."

"You show up here smelling like alcohol one more time ... and you won't work in Washington again. Hell, you won't work again period. Not if I can help it."

I'm going to faint. Any minute now. "Yes, sir."

"Addison," he continues. "I didn't hold your job and beg you to come back here every week for this. Clean up your act or go back to California because I won't have it. Understand?"

"Yes."

"Neither one of you are to get near a patient today. As a matter of fact, I don't even want you near charts. There's a mess in the hallway on the second floor where they're working on the freight elevator. Go get brooms and clean it up. When you finish that ... get out of my hospital and when you come back tomorrow, you better be bright eyed, bushy tailed, and ready to save some damn lives ... starting with your own ... because I'll wring both of your necks if you give me another reason."

Okay, he didn't even yell ... but his words are echoing in my head the entire time I walk toward the freight elevator of evil.

Addison and I draw up short when we see the mess. There are ceiling tiles, sheet rock pieces, dust and all around hideous-ness waiting for us at the end of the the hallway. She reaches into her pocket and withdraws a hair scrunchie, pulling her hair up in a messy knot. "The one patient a day thing at the Oceanside Wellness Clinic looks pretty great right about now," she tells me.

I twist my hair into a knot and secure it with a pencil. We dive into the mess without mentioning how much it sucks ... we're living it ... we know.

It must be a jock thing. Mark and Karev seem to sense that we're being humiliated so they show up and mock us mercilessly. They stand outside the yellow caution tape that Addison and I crawled under and talk about us like we're not there. They do a running commentary like we're zoo animals in a fucking documentary and it gets to me. Just like the jocks were capable of doing in high school ... they get under my skin and make me cry.

I pretend it's the dust.

Addison knows better. She finally hears me sniffle one too many times and gets to her feet. I guess what they say about redheads and their temper is true.

She sends a piece of ceiling tile flying like a frisbee and I watch with awe and wonder as it bounces off Alex's head and pops Mark in the mouth.

They don't say another word.

There's a little superhero in all of us.

Erica didn't have to work very hard to become my best friend. I knew the first night that we hung out and she knocked my darts off the board with her own that I was going to like her. We laughed the whole night and nearly every night after that. The only thing more fun than talking to her ... was listening to her talk. Before we ever became lovers, she was my goto person for a bad day and she would listen to me rant and then sum it all up with a colorful expletive. The only real fight we had while we were platonic friends ... was during a camping trip. She yelled at me while we were setting up the tent and I was hot, hungry, and cranky so I yelled right back and it was ON. We weren't hurtful, but we picked apart every aspect of the other person's camping ability and when I told her that she didn't even know how to pack her damn supplies and she told me that the only reason I could pack mine was because I lived out of my backpack ... we stopped, looked at one another, and apologized before a line could be crossed. Ten minutes later, it was the fight hadn't happened at all and we were laughing over the fact that the directions for the tent had been written in French only.

I want my best friend right now.

I want to track her down and tell her all about the meeting with Chief Webber and listen to her sarcastically tell me what he should do with himself.

And I need her to tell me what happened with Cristina so that I can help her.

Addison is a great friend, but she's not my best friend and I'm not hers. Naomi is hers and when I listen to her call Naomi in the car after work ... it drives home that fact. She talks with her in that open, comfortable way that I talk to Erica about life's smallest details. Before Addison can park at the Archfield ... I ask her to drop me off at my car. She gives me a knowing smile and the second key to her room, but I'm really hoping that I won't need it. I drive all over town and can't find a single florist that is open past five. I settle for stopping at Wal-Mart and I buy the least tacky bouquet of wildflowers that they have. I also spend way too much time prowling through the 'I'm Sorry' cards and by the time I find the right one it's already dark outside. There's also a thunderstorm brewing and the sky looks like a strobe light as I pour my heart out on the front inside flap of the card. I want to say much more than what will fit there, but I had a burning desire to see her more.

By the time I get to Erica's the bottom has dropped out of the sky and there are buckets of water splashing on my windshield. I park right next to the wrap around porch on the front of her house and dart across the stepping stones. It doesn't matter how fast you are when God is throwing water balloons at you. I'm drenched to the skin by the time I ring the bell and when I pull the card from under my shirt, which I thought would protect it, the baby pink envelope is fuchsia in spots. I try to shake it off as I ring the bell again, but it's no use. I make the spots become streaks and have to hope that it's the thought that counts. When ten minutes pass ... I resign myself to the fact that she's not home and leave the flowers and the card resting against the front door and brave the monsoon to get back in my car. I call her two more times before I drive away and I feel like my heart is being grinded under the tires.

I stop to eat comfort food (Burger King) and call the hospital to see if she's still at work. They tell me she left an hour ago and I head back to her place after I've stuffed myself with a Whopper and fries. Wrong thing to do, by the way. My stomach hates me. Guess she was right about the diet thing. When I pull into the driveway again the rain is still falling, but I can see that the flowers and the card are gone. My shoes squish from all the water and I know that my hair is plastered to my face when I ring the bell again, but I happily stand there and wait. A long time. Almost long enough to make me change my mind and leave, but I finally see a light turn on inside and she moves the curtain to the left and looks at me. She's wearing a white button down shirt and her hair is pulled back in a ponytail when she opens the door and I've never seen it like that, but I love it. I don't move as she glares at me through the storm door. It could be the crack of thunder or the bolt of lightning that streaks through the sky that makes her let me in ... or it could be my face. Either way ... she unlocks it and holds it open. I leave my wet shoes outside on the porch and step past her.

She smells so good and I can tell by the fact that her collar is wet that she was showering. Or maybe she got hit by a few water balloons, too.

"I would have thought that you could take a hint. If I don't answer the phone then I don't want to talk to you in person, either," she tells me. "I'm not in a very good mood so -"

"Neither am I. And you not answering the phone didn't help."

"Hint, hint."

"Erica-"

"What!?"

I push my hair off my forehead. "This sucks."

Looking down at my bare feet, she sees the puddle that is rapidly forming on the throw rug. "I'll go get a towel."

"Wait." Grabbing her arm is the wrong thing to do because the second she tugs it from my grip and pulls away ... I want the floor to open up and swallow me. If she's ever pulled away from me before, I've obviously repressed it because it hurts. Really, really bad. I can't do it. I can't be here with her and not touch her so I turn around and go back onto the porch. Bending down, I pick up my shoes and am in the process of slipping them back on when she follows me and says, "You tell me to wait so that I can watch you leave?"

"What do you want me to do!?"

"Say something!"

The thunder seems to shake the foundation of her house and it pierces through my head like an ice pick. "I'm sorry."

Her eyes are blurred with tears now. "Hallmark already said that for you. Do you want to say anything else?"

"I don't know, Erica! Are you going to listen!?"

"Depends."

I'm exhausted. I'm beyond exhausted and my entire body is aching from the physical labor that Webber forced me to perform. I've heard elderly patients say that they were bone tired and soul weary, but I never understood that until now. "What do you need me to say to you? What!?"

"If you need to ask me that then I'm sure I don't want to hear it."

I tighten my grip on my purse to keep from shaking her. "How can you be pissed at me for trying to have more with you than ... this, Erica?"

"This? What does that mean?"

"THIS! RIGHT HERE! WE DESERVE BETTER THAN THIS!"

"I DESERVE MORE THAN YOU COMING AND GOING LIKE I'VE GOT A REVOLVING DOOR, CALLIE!"

"I HAVE NEVER TREATED YOU LIKE THAT!"

"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU DO WHEN YOU COME HERE AND FUCK ME THEN LEAVE!?"

I start down the stairs and she darts out into the rain ahead of me, leaning against my car door to prevent me from opening it. The sky peals with light and I see a flash just beyond her driveway that is accompanied by a loud boom and I yell, "GO IN THE HOUSE BEFORE YOU GET STRUCK BY LIGHTNING!"

"YOU'RE THE ONE WHO GOT WASTED LAST NIGHT! IF ANYONE SHOULD BE WORRIED ... IT'S YOU!"

"GOD, YOU PISS ME OFF!"

"WELCOME TO MY WORLD!"

"GO INSIDE, ERICA!"

"YOU GO INSIDE!"

I shake my head and shove my hair out of my face. At the rate we're going, we should just join the carousel of color in Jazz's mural lamp because all we're doing is running in circles. "Fuck. Why don't we both go inside?"

"Fine."

"Fine.'

"Go," I say.

"Give me your keys."

"What?"

"Your keys. Give them to me so that you can't run the second you want to."

Another bolt of lightning, this one so close that my eternal soul stands up to rebuke Satan, sends us both scrambling up the steps and nearly mauling one another as we try to fit through the door at once. The power is off in the house when we finally get inside and she slams the heavy wooden front door as if it can keep the wolf at bay. I think maybe she doesn't understand that the wolf is under both of our skins, tearing us up inside. I hear her walk across the floor and bump into things, and then she lights a candle and looks at me over it. If she minds that I'm puddling on the hardwood she doesn't mention it. What she does say is, "What can the Archfield give you that I can't, Cal?"

"Nothing."

"Then why?"

My teeth are chattering because she had the air on in her house, but I don't pay attention to it. "I want to enjoy the little things and spend the night with you sometimes so that I don't take every time for granted. If we rush through the little things to get to the big things we won't remember it, but if we do it slow then ... when I do move in with you, and I WILL, we'll both value what it took to get there. If that pisses you off, Yellow, then be pissed off."

"It does and I am." She points down the hall. "But you can still borrow something of mine to wear."

"How generous of you. Can I spend the night, too, or is that asking too much?"

"Only because it's raining, but you're gonna sleep in the guest room. Which is where the guests stay."

I'll show her! Oh, yes I will!

In her bedroom, she puts the candle on the end table and rifles around in her dresser. She tosses me a pair of yoga pants and a t-shirt that says Johns Hopkins University on the front. I feel like she's sharing a part of herself with me because she told me once that the shirt is a favorite of hers ... one that she slept in for most of her college duration. She wore it one of the nights she dropped by the apartment I shared with Mark. It was after my surgery, after we had made love in Miami, and I kept watching her out of the corner of my eye. I kept imagining what it would feel like to run my hand under it and then show her just how much she meant to me. We had kept it friendly then. Almost too friendly. We were so sugary sweet and friendly that it almost killed me every time she said goodnight. I would invent reasons for her to stay another five minutes, another ten. I was wrong about breaking up with Mark before I cheated on him ... I cheated with her in my head every second of the day.

And I'd happily take that sugary sweet, molasses filled friendship that we forged after she cut me open because I've had a bad day and I need to talk to her. I take a deep breath, holding the shirt in my fist. "Erica, I really want to sit down and talk to you for a -"

"I'm tired. I'm going to bed," she tells me.

"You never did tell me what Chief Webber said about Cristina."

She shrugs. "He said I have to teach her."

"Are you okay with that?"

"Let's see ... trying to teach a hot shot know it all who second guesses my every move in the OR ... should I be okay with it?"

"Maybe you should try with her. I mean, she wants to impress you and -"

"Well, she doesn't."

"I know that -"

"I DO NOT WANT TO TALK ABOUT YANG! GO TO BED!"

"DON'T DISMISS ME LIKE A CHILD!"

"DON'T ACT LIKE ONE!"

I swallow to keep from snapping. "You know what I miss? I miss talking to my best friend. I miss hearing about her horrible day and telling her about mine so if you see her ... could you tell her that!?"

I whirl on my heel and stalk across the hall to the guest bedroom. I guess I won't be showing her after all. If the power wasn't off and I could actually see ... I'd leave ... and I'm not wearing her stupid clothes either. I strip out of mine and fumble to the bed where I eventually figure out where the cover is and pull it down. Before I can crawl under it, though, I trip over my pants and stub my toe and that, along with the shit day I've had, causes me to cry. I try very hard to be quiet about it, but the guestroom is quite possibly the loneliest room I've ever been in and my head hurts, my foot hurts, my heart is aching even worse and Erica ... is opening the door.

I roll over, turning my back to her when she carries the candle in.

I hear her set it on the table and the bed shifts when she sits down, but she doesn't touch me. "Okay ... fine ... as your best friend," she says, "I can tell you that your girlfriend really loves you and she will probably not be pissed very long. She'll come around. I'm on her side in this little argument, but I believe that it will work out. So, don't cry ... because that kills her."

When I don't reply, she puts one arm over me and rests her chin on my arm. "I have your favorite ice cream in the freezer and it's going to melt. Isn't there a rule somewhere that says you have to eat it after you fight with the person you love?"

I sniffle. "Cookie dough?"

"Do I not know you?" Reaching down, she brushes a tear off my nose. "Want it? It's gonna melt if you don't eat it."

"Okay."

She leaves the candle and when she fumbles down the hallway, I pull her shirt over my head and lean against the headboard while I wait for her. I hear something clatter and a litany of curses fly from her mouth, then she's back and she smiles at me as she hands me the Ben and Jerry's. "Thank you for the flowers, by the way. And the card. It helped."

I push the ice cream around with the spoon, but I don't eat it. That should tell you how bad I'm feeling right now. I'd trample a kitten if I thought Cold Stone Creamery was about to close down. I hear her sigh and glance up at her. She's still wearing the white button down shirt and it's kinda see through because it's wet and she's not wearing a bra. I think the worst part about dating your best friend is that you notice things you never noticed before and it's hard to concentrate on anything except what you feel like when you're not kissing them. I want to kiss her. I want to apologize for not being ready and for falling short of what she needs, but I'm exhausted. I've said all I can say.

I watch her eyes follow a tear down my cheek and look back at the ice cream. I don't want that either. She pulls the cover down beside me and sits with her back against the headboard the same way mine is. Reaching over, she takes the ice cream and eats a bite of it. "It's good. You know you want some."

I shake my head. "I thought you were going to bed."

"I want to tell you about my horrible day." She dips the spoon again and takes another bite. "Webber basically said that he hired me at Seattle Grace because he wanted the best teacher. He said that Burke of all people had recommended me when he resigned. Burke. BURKE recommended me. Do you wanna know why I hate Preston so much?"

"Sure."

"I'll tell you if you eat some of this." She holds the container out again and I accept it. She doesn't speak again until I comply, then I hand it back to her. "We went to college together. You knew that part. What you don't know is that Burke struggled with his grades. He somehow got the scholarship I needed from the get-go, even though he didn't really need it. First day of class and he showed up in his Mercedes with the top down and every girl in the vicinity went running to stroke his ego. I didn't. I wouldn't give him the time of day so naturally that piqued his interest and he started trying to turn on the charm with me. I tutored him for six months and yet -"

"Oh god ... if you say you slept with him I'm going to ... vomit."

"I didn't sleep with him."

"Whew."

"But he slept with my favorite professor, a woman that I had more than one fantasy about, and I'm pretty sure that the two point lead he had over me when we graduated had a hell of a lot more to do with him hitting that than the books." She digs a chunk of cookie dough from the depths and holds it out to me.

I pluck it from the spoon and say, "How do you know he was sleeping with her?"

"I left my notes in her room and interrupted them. She was face down, ass up on the desk and he just smiled at me and kept right on going."

"Daaaamn."

"And she made it clear that I'd never get a passing mark if I said a word. I didn't. I just watched him get everything handed to him and I had to work twice as hard, particularly in her class, but I still came in second." She stabs the ice cream now and I take it from her to keep her from plowing through the bottom and making a mess. "And he told Webber that I'm the best teacher. Because I tutored him. And that's a slap in my face that I KNOW he intended. It's his way of saying that I taught him so much that maybe I can take his place ... but I was still the second choice. He knows that I'm living in his shadow here."

"Or maybe ... it's his way of acknowledging that you earned it."

"I don't like it when you're optimistic. We're supposed to be cynical, pessimistic, and rude together."'

"What you said today at work about me pushing and pulling you in every direction ... it's true." My throat tightens up and I can't stop the tears that fall. I don't even try. "I never meant to hurt you."

She leans closer, her shoulder against mine. "What you said about rushing is also true. So let's make a deal, okay? You don't push or pull and I won't mention you moving in with me again. You can just show up on the doorstep when you're ready. I'll be waiting. Does that sound fair?"

"As your best friend ... I'm telling you that you're too generous and she doesn't deserve you."

"Why don't you reply as more than that?"

I rest my head against hers. "I love you. I have never felt this way in my entire life and it's more than fair. I won't make you wait long."

"I love you, too." She kisses my forehead. "But for God's sake stop crying before I go in the other room. I'm the one with cramps and bleeding."

"Damn it! Seriously!?" I hand her the ice cream and cross my arms over my chest like a petulant toddler. "I was about to seduce you!"

"Oh, sweet irony. How I love that you have to WAIT."

"How long does it usually last?"

"Five very fun filled days."

"FIVE!? Shit! Counting mine ... that's eight days out of the month that we're going to be sexless. Eight. Days. Ninety six days out of the year. That's two thousand three hundred and four hours that I will be thinking about sex, but not having it." I wipe my face with the sleeve of the t-shirt I'm wearing. "This does kind of explain your mood today, though."

"My ovaries did not cause my mood ... you did."

"Are you over it?"

"I am."

I look at her. "If I ask you really, really nicely to massage my back ... would you do it?"

"Why?"

"Because I spent most of the day being a construction worker and I ache all over."

"I'm not giving you a happy ending."

"You already gave me that."

"Smooth, Torres. Very smooth." She gives me a quick kiss and frowns. "WHY DO YOU SMELL LIKE A HAMBURGER!?"

My eyes widen and I clap a hand over my mouth, shrugging.

"Roll onto your stomach."

Ahh, massage. I happily comply, but she slaps me hard on the ass before she straddles my legs. "Ow!"

"I hope you enjoyed it. That was your last artery clogging and stomach churning hurrah."

She's probably wrong about that, but I don't mention it.

I fall asleep with her hands working their magic on my back ... she chases the tension away and I sleep like a baby.

Makeup sex is overrated. I ride to work with Erica and she holds my hand over the gear shifter, rubbing it with her thumb. She smiles at me every chance she gets and I realize that I don't have to have sex with her to feel absolutely and completely satisfied with her. We survived our first really bad fight as a couple and while I hope that we never press repeat on it, we made it out alive. We made it out together. As we ride in comfortable silence, I realize that there's a shocking difference in the way we fight than what I've previously experienced in relationships. With George, he didn't have the passion to really get into anything with me. He'd let me rant, listen to me yell, and very calmly state his opinion. It's because his heart wasn't in it. With Mark, he would be intentionally hurtful and say the cruelest things imaginable. I think that's because he knew that my heart wasn't in it. With Erica, both of our hearts are wrapped up in each other and I think that makes us hold back the insults and the put downs. We don't fly off the cuff and say anything we'll regret. At least not yet. Not while the couple thing is still so new.

I hope the grace period never wears off.

There are a couple of power outages along the way that turn former red light crossings into four way stops and she carefully navigates fallen tree limbs as we approach the city. The presence of two ambulances in the bay is a strong indication that the storm we endured is going to be felt for a while, but we're early and there's not rush to jump into the fray. She takes my hand as we walk across the parking lot and kisses me twice in the elevator before telling me to meet her in the cafeteria in fifteen minutes. I change into my scrubs and she's waiting for me when I emerge in less than ten. I don't complain when she hands me a bowl of oatmeal because that will give me leverage to make her not complain when I empty every available packet of Splenda into it, which I do, the moment we sit down. She watches me, but bites her tongue. Picking your battles in a relationship makes sense.

I'm stirring the lumpy mess when Shepherd walks up to our table carrying a bagel. "Mind if I join you?"

This is like a major infraction of the clique code. Mr. Popularity wants to sit with two people who are arguably the most awkward social outcasts in all of Seattle ... the storm must have done more damage than we know about. The earth if officially off its axis. "Uh, sure," I reply, bracing myself for the worst.

He pulls the chair out with his foot and sets his coffee on the table, taking a bite of his bagel. I swear on all that's Holy ... his tooth actually sparkles like a toothpaste commercial and when he speaks with his mouth full, it's not a flaw. It's foreplay. He's that damn suave, that damn perfectly coiffed, and dashing. I hate him on principal alone. "So, Addison talked to me about your brother last night. How old was he when the brain damage occurred."

Oh! That explains so much. "He was ten. That was fifteen years ago."

"Do you know which part of the brain is damaged?"

"The left side of his cerebrum and the hippocampus," I reply. "It's minor. He can speak, he can walk, and swim, and convey things, but ... it's not that minor. He can't read, can't write, can't do math or understand a movie. His life has him ... he doesn't have it."

Derek watches me as he chews his bagel. I squirm a little under the intensity of his look. I only thought I could stare him down. He swallows and says, "Have you looked at the mortality rates in the Fellman-Caputo? Beyond the ones from the forty people who were profiled in the medical journal? Because this isn't a new technique, it's not even a perfected technique. It's something that Fellman has been toying with for years. It's something that I assisted on as an intern and a resident quite a few times and we lost every patient. Caputo seems to think that he's figured out the problem by reducing the size of the tools needed, but you're still inserting something foreign into a brain and sending frequencies to it. Blood clots half the size of the Caputo transmitter have killed patients in an instant."

Erica clears her throat. "Would you say it's better to perform this surgery on someone with more significant damage?"

"I'm saying that a person who can walk, swim, and convey things could lose that ability or his life if my hand slips." Derek keeps looking at me. "But I'm willing to look at his medical history and the scans of his head if you can get that to me. I'm not guaranteeing anything, but it would be a big deal for Seattle Grace to be approved for this trial. So, I'll review it and let you know what I think."

"Thanks," I tell him.

"You're welcome." He stands up and looks from me to Erica. I don't know what he's thinking or if it there's something more he wants to say, but there's a thoughtful expression on his face that he sums up with a nod before he goes to join Mark. I can tell by Sloan's body language that he's grilling his friend about why he would dare infiltrate the enemy camp, but I can't be bothered to care about it. Mortality rates, brain damage, and transmitters are the only thoughts in my head. Jazz could survive the surgery, but be a vegetable. Or he could lose all ability to speak. Or see. Or swim. I've been concentrating on life or death as the only options, but now there's a big gray area that he could fall into. Joel carries the weight of Jasper's life as it is now ... I'd carry it if I hurt him any further. Whether I'm holding the scalpel or not.

Erica puts her hand on mine and squeezes. "Callie?"

"Do not say 'I told you so'."

"I wasn't going to. There's a lot to think about and research and you're lucky because those are two of my best assets. I think and research very, very well."

The thundercloud in my head breaks and I look down at her chest. "I can think of other things I would call your best assets."

She gooses me in the ribs. "Can you get your mind out of the gutter?"

"That's the only part of me that can be in the gutter. For five days."

"Four now."

"I'm going to die."

She tugs me closer to her and gives me a kiss. It's chaste, sweet, and not remotely sexual, but my body still tingles from it. "You'll be just fine."

"Let me buy you dinner tonight," I suggest, not letting her pull away. "The restaurant on top of the Archfield is amazing and the view will take your breath."

"This view does that." She winks at me and I kiss her again. "But I'll definitely meet you there. What time?"

"Eight?"

"It's a date." She sits back and starts to take a bite of her oatmeal, then stops. "Our first date, actually. As a couple I mean."

"How sad is it that we had our first fight already, but not our first date?"

"Not quite as sad as the fact that we've had a ton of sex already and can't possibly do it tonight."

"Stop reminding me," I snap, but I'm smiling at her. "And I don't have sex on the first date anyway."

"I'm sure I believe that." She gets to her feet and kisses my forehead, picking up her tray. "I have to go and check on a patient before surgery. Will you please eat?"

"Sure." I make a face as I press the spoon into the now cold oatmeal. "I'll get right on that."

"I'm sure I believe that too, baby." She heads toward the door.

"Hey, Erica," I call after her.

She turns and I motion for her to come back. "What?"

"I like it when you call me baby."

"I like it when you call me Yellow."

I'm not nervous about going to dinner with Erica. I'm not.

Of course, I change clothes four times and wear a freakin' dress, but I'm not nervous.

When I meet her in the lobby, she's wearing a dressy looking short sleeved blazer thing and matching pants. I wonder if I went to her place after dinner ... would I find a pile of discarded clothing to rival the one I left in my room? Granted, she probably does laundry more often than I do and didn't make two separate piles based on what smelled fresh and what didn't, but that's not really the point. Addison wasn't around to help me out, either. I lived by her rule of thumb and chose a label instead of what was the most comfortable. I'm little black dress certified in the Donna Karan that my mother bought during our shopping trip in Miami. My tan still looks nice enough to pull off the spaghetti straps and the cheating that I have definitely been doing on my 'diet' has not hurt me. It's actually a little looser than it was in Miami, but it still hugs in all the right places.

She watches me approach her and I feel the dress coming off as she strips me naked with her eyes. I don't think another human being on the face of the earth could make me feel as sexy and wanted as she does. It's not even big gestures on her part, either. It's the way she knows my flaws and pushes past them to get to me. She has literally touched every inch of my body, even the crooked toe that I've broken twice because my bare foot can find anything deadly in a room in under ten seconds, and she doesn't make me feel like anything is wrong. I've got scars, freckles, moles, and my stomach will never, ever be flat no matter how tight my Spanx are, and she doesn't see anything except something beautiful. If my one major accomplishment in life is making her feel that way, too, then I'd say I did something great.

"Hey," I tell her, leaning in to give her a kiss.

She cups my face when our lips meet. That's another thing she does and it's nothing out of the ordinary, that makes my heart skip a couple of beats. "I like this dress. It's very, very tight."

"And I can't wear panties under it for that very reason."

"Evil." She threads her fingers through mine as we head upstairs, where I reserved the corner most table with the best view.

The table is round and the bench seat is shaped like a horseshoe. The open end is a view of the Space Needle and everything surrounding it. The best part, though, is the fact that the bench has a built in, circular wall that makes it impossible for nosy people to watch you try to enjoy your dinner. It's secluded. You almost feel like you're alone on top of the world for a while. At least ... while the wait staff isn't bothering you. The maitre d' seats us with a flourish of his hand and gives us each a leather bound menu while he warbles about the fresh catch of the day. His accent is French tonight. It was German, then Latino, while I was married to George. Before that ... it was so Manhattan that I had to lean into him to understand it. He tries on accents, he told me one night just before closing, because he's trying to write a book about a motley crew of immigrants who converge on Seattle and try to open a restaurant that can reflect all of their cultures.

Hell, I would eat there. Anyplace that I could get a New York pizza, enchiladas, schnitzel, and crème brûlée would be my idea of gluttonous ecstasy.

She's sitting close enough to me that I feel the heat from her thigh, but not her actual thigh. It's tempting. Very, very tempting.

We order wine and eat salad with croutons the size of bricks.

By the time our steaks arrive, I'm obsessing over her hair the same way Jazz does. I can't even stop myself ... I reach up and brush my fingers through the end. It's straight. I only thought that I liked it curly more. She's cutting into her filet mignon when I do it and she glances over at me. I push it over her shoulder and kiss her behind the ear. It's going to be a very, very long night.

The only thing we have in common from our childhood ... is intense storms. I had hurricanes and tropical depressions and she had tornados and hail.

I'm fascinated when she tells me about a strange phenomenon of chickens losing their feathers, but not their lives. I can't help but laugh when she describes her neighbors chicken coop being gutted and thousands of featherless, scrawny looking birds flapping their flightless wings against the ground and chirping their displeasure at being stripped. I'm pretty sure that chickens don't chirp, but I've never really been around one so I don't know that for sure. Our pasts are as different as they can possibly be. She tells me that she grew up in a trailer for the most part and not the kind that you put in a trailer park. The kind that actually rolls around and looks like a silver bullet. When her parents did eventually break and move into a house ... it was because the tires went flat on the trailer and not because they wanted to give her roots. She doesn't have to describe the houses she lived in ... multiple houses ... because I can picture it in my head. It's not pretty. There's a row of houses called Shanty Heights in Miami. My mother didn't want me to play with a girl who lived there, but she relented because the girl was the only person to ever invite me anywhere. I couldn't spend the night. I didn't want to after I saw roaches the size of rats and rats the size of cats. The plumbing would bang when you flushed the toilet and the floor sagged enough to make me think I'd fall through. I was so happy to leave that I could have cried the one and only time I was allowed to go.

My mother made me shower twice when she picked me up.

And then she combed my hair with a lice comb for two hours.

I don't tell Erica any of that.

I tell her about my father's refusal to leave his home when a hurricane approaches. Hell, we were vacationing in New York once and he took us HOME because a hurricane was brewing. Most people were fleeing Miami, but not my dad. He stayed and forced us to stay to batten down the hatches. I spent more than one night in the Panic Room he built, watching windows break and palm trees fall against the house on the security cameras inside the room. She doesn't find much amusement in my story and asks me if that's why I was shaking so bad during last night's storm. Even in my sleep, she said, I would tremble when thunder rolled.

I tell her I don't know. That I slept through it.

We move on to dessert. She orders fruit and ... proving once again that we're not that much alike ... I opt for Death by Chocolate.

I take a bite and close my eyes to savor it. "This? Possibly better than sex. Or at the very least it helps me cope with lack of it."

That's when I feel her hand on my thigh. She continues to eat her berries and melons and grapes as her left hand pushes my skirt up. When she encounters the fact that I did not lie about my lack of panties, she smiles and says, "Let's test that theory."

I lick my spoon when she urges my legs apart. The white tablecloth hangs low, but I still drop my napkin over her hand as she slides it against me. If the waiter comes right now ... I will stab him. She is still eating, acting like she's not doing things to me that are making me squirm and breathe funny. I watched her tongue dart out to lick a little bit of whip cream off a strawberry and my hand joins hers. I push her fingers against me, exactly where and how I need them to be, and she doesn't disappoint. Her middle finger dips into me, then flicks over my clit until I moan. She looks to the right, which is where the table closest to us is, but we can't see them and they can't see us. Her middle finger moves into me again and she rubs the heel of her hand over my clit, massaging and grinding against it until my fork clatters to the table and I have to grip the edge of the table with everything I have to keep from screaming my release. It's a good one. It's the kind that makes your inner thighs quiver and your breathing come in hitches. I can feel my eyes glaze with relief and she doesn't move her hand until I'm coming down.

When she runs her middle finger, THAT MIDDLE FINGER, through the cream on her plate and sucks it clean ... I. Could. Faint.

She clears her throat and eats a piece of watermelon before she speaks. "Your ice cream is melting."

I don't even ask for a to go box for the cake.

My theory was wrong.

In the elevator ... she kisses me in a way that it all tongue, all passion, and all pleasure. I grip her hips and hold her against me as she messes up the curls that took me forty minutes to de-frizz. I don't even care. And she makes me forget that elevators have become my new least favorite thing. By the time we get to the lobby, her pink lipgoss and my berry has mixed into something that's actually very pretty on her and she's breathing just as hard as I was at the dinner table. "It's pretty late," she says. "You could invite me to spend the night with you and I'd say yes."

"Okay."

"I brought a bag, just in case." She grins at me and takes my hand as we walk out to her car to retrieve it.

Ten minutes of making out against the trunk later ... we walk down the hallway of the nineteenth floor toward room thirty seven. I'm thinking about lilacs and the things she did to me at the dinner table. I'm thinking about what I'll be doing to her during the three days I have my period and how I can convince her to do them to me now. When her hand slides over my backside, I don't think I'll have to coax her much.

What I'm not thinking about ... is Addison.

It doesn't even register with me that I've got a roommate or that Erica doesn't know or that my foot slides over something as I open the door.

Light from the hallway spills over the darkened room and illuminates Addison, who is on top of Mark and moving her hips in a way that she never, ever moved on the dance floor. If she had moved like that ... El Diablo would have been a man undone. I register the look of outrage on Mark's face the same time he yells, "You're living with her!?"

Erica actually yells the same thing in perfect harmony.

"SOCK ON THE DOOR!" Addy screeches, pulling the cover over her head.

I look down and sure enough, there's a sock lying in the floor. I hold up my hands in mock surrender and pull the door shut without saying a word.

Erica is halfway down the hall.

I yank my heels off to chase after her. "Erica!"

She stabs the elevator button and says, "How would you feel if the woman that was at my house the night you came started staying in my guestroom?"

"It's not the same. I never slept with Addison."

"Okay," she replies. "Do you remember telling me how you felt knowing that George's best friend was beautiful and funny and always around?"

"You're my best friend, Erica."

"Were you going to tell me that you're living with a very attractive woman in a hotel?"

"Well, I was going to leave out the 'very attractive' part, but I was going to tell you."

"When?"

"Does everything that I do piss you off?"

"This wouldn't piss you off if the tables were turned?"

"I trust you," I reply.

"That's why you hid in my bathroom and played twenty questions with me about Helen, isn't it?"

"Helen? That's her name? Sounds like an old woman."

"She's younger than you, though quite a bit more mature. She has a home after all. She doesn't lug her stuff around in a garbage bag."

"Ah, we're back to you calling me a child, huh?" I hear a door slam behind me and turn to see Mark stalking toward us. He shoves his arms into his jacket and I cringe when he stops beside us. "Great."

He pokes the elevator button several times, then glares down at me. "The truly pathetic part," he says, "is that I wasn't thinking about you. I finally get you out of my fucking head and you show up in the flesh."

The doors slide open and Erica steps into the lift, not looking my way. "Erica -"

"Run while you can, Hahn," Mark says. "She's a commitment phobe."

"Refrain from stating the obvious, Sloan," Erica replies. "Or you can wait for the next elevator."

He steps in beside her and I'm too shocked to follow.

The doors slide shut on him asking her if she has ever met anyone with more relationship hang-ups than me.

I don't hear her reply.

I don't think I want to hear her reply.

I trudge down the hall with the weight of the world settled somewhere near my shoulder blades.

Before I unlock the door of the hotel room for the second time ... I knock.

Addison yanks it open and looks out at me. "You? Sort of suck. You texted me earlier and said that you were having dinner with Erica and would be out late."

"It is late."

"Oh ... well ... sock on the door!"

I nudge the sock with my bare toe. "Not so much."

"Who's the black cloud of doom now?" she asks, moving aside. "Jesus, Callie! This is the first night he's been sober since I got here and you - you - damn it!"

I can smell his cologne now. Armani. I gave it to him for his birthday. That was actually the morning that he kissed me with shaving gel all over his face. He was happy then. Kind of. He's miserable now, though. He's lost weight and he doesn't smile much that I've seen.

I'm a human wrecking ball. There are four of us circling around each other now, scenting blood. Addison is ready to be what Mark needed all along. He became what she needed with me. I'm trying to be who Erica needs and she's always been what I need, and the mess we're in is my doing. I toss my shoes into the corner of the room and sit down on the bed. She sits across from me on hers, pulling her robe tighter around her.

"Was dinner good?" she asks.

"Yeah."

"I'm glad something was."

Was.

Past tense.

I wonder, as I sit there watching her worry her bottom lip between her teeth, if what I have with Erica will be past tense, too.

For my sake, I hope not.

Because nothing will kill me faster than that.


	13. Chapter 13

Reason number 234758 that it's great to be a doctor:

Thirty nine hour shifts.

I didn't exactly volunteer for it or necessarily feel like being on my feet for eighteen of those thirty nine hours with just two thirty minute breaks, but I'm not going to complain either. Summertime in Washington State brings out the crazies. It brings them out en masse. I don't know if it's the hit or miss sunshine that breaks through the clouds or the magnificent views to see while hiking that draws them from the woodwork, but their stupidity is my gain. You probably think it's mean to call someone who has fallen off the face of a rock while climbing stupid ... but there are ropes for a reason and he neglected to use them. He didn't use any safety gear at all because half a case of beer made him ten feet tall and bulletproof. He wasn't feeling very bulletproof as we prepped him for surgery and I don't know if my right hand will ever grip properly again after using a drill for around ten hours, however, it was a refreshing change of pace to concentrate on work and nothing else. I'll mourn the loss of my hand if Erica never uses hers again ... on me ... because I don't think it will ever be the same again.

I slept three of the thirty nine hours before being called back to the ER for 'Rolling Thunder'. That's what we call back to back ambulances that roll in so fast that it's like the Indy 500 at the doors. Again, I need to mention that summer's greatest yielding of fruit ... is fools. I treat an Einstein who jumped off the roof into a three foot kiddie pool to impress his five year old son. Yeah, let's hope the apple fell very far from that tree. A woman comes in who decided to pick berries on the side of a ravine, got spooked by a lizard and broke her leg in the ensuring hilarity. And my personal favorite is the guy who put a canine shock collar around his neck and climbed a tree to 'howl' at the moon. I can't wait for his toxicology to come back. Seriously. The sheer volume of idiocy is enough to make me fear for humanity. He opened his mouth in a wolf cry that turned into a scream of shock and pain because he had the collar on the highest setting, and every branch of that tree seemed to break something else in him. I thought it was bad to nearly die from an ulcer. No, it's worse to say you got a liver laceration from being dumb as hell. Howl at the moon on firm ground and if you're into pain buy a set of nipple clamps, dude.

I don't say that.

But I'm thinking it.

What I'm actively not thinking about ... is Erica.

She's been swamped, too. Heatstrokes and heart attacks seem to monopolize the board. I know she consulted with the woman who saw the lizard because she had numbness in her left arm, but she didn't do it while I was around. I haven't called, texted, or done anything where she's concerned. I haven't been to her house, either. I'm not going to apologize that she doesn't trust me. That's her own inner demon to spank and I'm not going to do it for her. I'm not going to do anything. Relationships are hard and I don't have have to apologize for not getting it right all the time. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't have a lot of experience to pull from with men and I have zero experience to pull from with women and she knew that. It's not my fault if I don't know which hoops I'm supposed to jump through and when I'm supposed to sit and when I'm supposed to fetch like a good dog. Erica had a very long relationship with Rachel so of course she knows how to do everything.

Okay, that was the pep talk I gave myself as I walked to my car at ten minutes past eleven at night. As soon as I sit down in the seat and drive to the Archfield ... I know I'm lying to myself. It is my fault. I knew that me living at the Archfield would hurt Erica. I knew that me living with Addison at the Archfield would absolutely destroy her. I knew that I was shooting myself in the foot when I agreed to stay there with Addy but what I didn't know was that it would hurt so much to be left there by Erica. We have entirely too much passion in our relationship. If she had not mauled me under the table at the restaurant I would have had a clear head and not invited her to my room.

If my brain would just stop making excuses for me being as stupid as the rest of the world ... I'd drive to Erica's house and try to make amends. Again.

Living with her at her house can't possibly be as hard as living without her.

When I get to the room that I'm sharing with Addison, I notice that there is a sock on the door. This time it's been tied around the doorknob and I get the point.

I don't care that Addison is sleeping with Mark. Not really. He called her the night that he stormed out and I heard her crying in the bathroom when she talked to him. He deserves someone with passion and I really think she feels that for him. At least ... I hope she does. Because he's a good guy and I don't think you ever get over your first love. She was definitely his. Even at the height of our relationship, when he thought I was possibly feeling something for him, too, his ears would perk at the mention of her name. I couldn't be jealous and he didn't seem concerned if I noticed. And he's moving on. He's moving on and I'm standing still.

I decide to spend a little quality time with Jack Daniels. The door opens suddenly, before I'm three feet away. I cringe, expecting the worst ... and that's exactly what I get.

Alex Karev is yanking his shirt over his head and when he sees me, he snaps, "Bitch is crazy."

Addison appears in the doorway and starts to slam it, but she sees me and her blue eyes register shock, then something like fear. I don't watch Karev walk away ... I watch her. Finally, she steps aside and lets me in. My eyes go to her bed which is made, but rumpled to high hell. She sits down on it, but doesn't say anything. When I entered the hotel, I was so exhausted that I think I dozed in the elevator, but now? Now I'm wide awake and totally freaking out. I lean against the wall, trying to figure out how the stupid that is blazing through Seattle got to her. "What are you doing?" I finally demand.

"I don't know."

"Did you sleep with him? ADDISON!"

"MARK DOESN'T WANT ME!"

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?" I repeat, throwing my purse on the bed. "ALEX KAREV!?"

"MIND YOUR OWN DAMN BUSINESS!"

"I CAN NOT BELIEVE THAT YOU ARE FUCKING KAREV!"

"YOU CANNOT HAVE AN OPINION, CALLIE! YOU ARE FUCKING ERICA HAHN!"

My bottom jaw drops open. "The major difference here ... is that I'm in love with her. You've been waxing poetic about how much you still love Mark so what are you doing?"

"None of your business!"

"Mark is my business, Addison. I care what happens and -"

"Yeah ... bullshit. You really have a great way of showing how much you 'care'."

"He was good friend to me!"

"And you buried a knife in his back so don't judge me! You are the one who fucked him up! Not me!"

"NOW IT'S MY TURN TO CALL BULLSHIT! DO YOU KNOW THAT HE STILL HAS A FUCKING YANKEE'S ONESIE! DO YOU KNOW THAT HE MEMORIZED THE DUE DATE OF THE BABY THAT YOU ABORTED AND WENT AND PUT A DAMN FLOWER IN THE BAY WHEN IT ROLLED AROUND!?"

"THAT IS LOW! THAT IS BEYOND LOW!"

"SO ARE YOU!"

I can say this for Addison Forbes Montgomery ... when she slaps your face ... you feel it all the way to your gut.

It sounds like a whip cracking and when it connects and my head rocks back a little.

She puts both hands over her mouth and shakes her head in shock.

She slaps the piss out of me and she's the one in shock. "Oh my god. Callie, I am so -"

I grab my purse off the bed because I will not let her see me cry. I absolutely, positively will not let her see me shed one tear and it's already rolling down my cheek so leaving is my best option. She tempts face by grabbing my arm because I am very, very motivated to slap her back. "Don't."

"I didn't sleep with Alex. I couldn't." She tightens her grip on my arm. "I'm sorry. I don't know what's wrong with me."

I look at her. She stares at the tear on my cheek. I'll let her have that one, but only that one. "I'm sorry, too. I'll come back tomorrow for my things."

"No! Don't leave! Callie, I am so sorry. I just -"

"You're not. Sorry. You're not sorry that you called me a conniving bitch because that's what you think I am. You're didn't come to Miami to ask me if I was okay ... you came so that you could see for yourself that I was out of the picture. And you didn't ask me to stay here with you because you wanted me to ... you think of me as the enemy and you wanted to keep your enemy close."

"That's not true." She doesn't have much conviction in her voice.

This is me hitting the nail on the head and piercing the heart of our problem. "Yeah, it is. It would be easier if you could hate me. Isn't that what you said?"

"Please don't go."

I don't reply. I don't do anything except leave.

Addison calls my phone before I make it to the lobby, but I ignore it. At the front desk, someone calls my name and I turn, nodding at the girl behind the counter. She gives me a stuffed Fed-Ex envelope and I recognize Joel's handwriting on the front. I called him to ask for Jasper's medical records and scans. He took them from my father's study and copied them all, then overnighted them after I lied and said that I needed to write a research paper about brain damage. My brother is gullible. Or maybe this is his way of making amends for thinking I'm a pervert. Either way, I'm not going to look at gift horse in the mouth. I take the packet and drive to The Emerald City Bar to look over it. And to drink. For what it's worth, being slapped in the face will wake your ass up, even if you've only had three hours of sleep in nearly two full days.

It's after midnight when I sit down at a corner table and open the envelope. Last call will be at two so that gives me plenty of time to sort through the paperwork and get it in order. Joe comes up and asks me what I'll have and I think big ... four shots of Jack and a gin and tonic. He whistles and heads behind the bar. I begin the painful process of reliving my brother's nightmare. The copies are decent, but some of the papers were clearly wrinkled when they were fed into the copier. I begin sorting by date and put the disc containing the head scans into my purse for safe keeping. By the time I work the bulk of the information into a cohesive time frame, it's nearing one thirty. I've downed three shots and start to feel it in my stomach when a shadow falls across the table.

I glance up and see that Erica is there, looking slightly windblown and a little damp from the rain that was threatening to fall when I parked. She doesn't say a thing, she just leans over and tilts my chin, looking at the mark on my face. Her mouth becomes a pencil thin line and I see a vision in my head of her tugging Addison bald. "She called you?" I ask.

"She called me," Erica confirms, rubbing her thumb over my cheek. I lean into it and she pulls back. "Which is more than I can say for you."

"Hey, you know my number, too, Yellow."

Without asking, she takes the gin and tonic and the remaining shot from my table and returns it to the bar, saying something to Joe, who nods at her. It annoys and touches me in equal measures. She cares about me drinking myself into a stupor whether she's pissed at me or not. When she comes back, she sets the three empty glasses aside and picks up the paperwork, carefully stacking it. She doesn't ask me what it is, but I see her eyes move over the patient name. Holding out her hand, she motions for the files that I'm still working on. I want to protest, I want to say that I've got it, but I don't. I simply hold it out and she puts those in her purse. She returns the sorted files to the envelope and stows that under her arm. "Come on."

"Where are we -"

"Are you going to sleep in your car? You're damn sure not driving."

"I was going to go back to the hospital and sleep in the on call room."

"You're off tomorrow."

"And?"

"And if Richard smells this shit on your breath again ... you're going to have hell to pay."

"I'm off tomorrow."

She leans down, her face just a few inches from mine. "You can either come the easy way or I can drag you. What's it gonna be?"

"Dragging me could be kinda hot."

"Not the way I'd do it."

"Damn." I get to my feet and stagger a little. Alcohol on an empty stomach may not have been the brightest idea I've had. I start toward the bar to pay my tab, but she takes my hand and pulls me along behind her. "But -"

"We'll pay it next time."

"What's the rush?"

"I'm tired. I'm not very happy right now and I've got surgery at nine thirty. Get in the car." She opens the passenger door and points inside. Something in her face stops me from uttering the slightest sound of protest. She slams the door and opens the back one, throwing her purse inside. When she gets in, she glances my way and says, "Put your seatbelt on."

"Yes, Mom." I comply, but she doesn't start the engine. I glance at her. She's got both hands on the wheel, but she's glaring straight at me. It's the kind of look that makes you want to spill your guts over every past mistake you've ever made. I should have called her 'dad'. He has that look in spades. "Sorry."

"I watched my parents turn up a bottle every single time something went wrong," she tells me. "Please don't make me watch that with you. You're better than this."

I nod at her. She looks at me a little longer before she turns the key and drives onto the main road. This isn't really what I expected when I finally saw her again. I was prepared for yelling, crying, possibly throwing things ... but not this. It's disconcerting and makes me feel like the rug is about to be yanked from under me. I don't say anything for ten minutes. I know it's ten minutes because I watch the time tick past on the radio and every one of those minutes mark sixty seconds that I waste by not saying what I should be saying. I finally take the plunge. "Why are you being so nice to me?"

She stops at a red light, staring up at it. "When I tell you that I love you ... I mean it. I don't say it to hear myself talk."

"You think I do?!"

"Do not say another word." She waits a beat to see if I will comply. I surprise myself by zipping my lips. "You have every right to be guarded with me, Callie. I can't hold it against you that you want to take the long way home to me because the fact that you won't rush means that you care. It means that you've learned a few lessons and you're taking them seriously."

The light turns and she eases through it. I can tell that her hands are gripping the wheel like a vise. "What I can hold against you is that you won't commit to me better than this. Even when you're mad at me, even when I'm mad at you ... we cannot leave each other hanging for two days without a word. That's not healthy and that's not commitment."

"You didn't call me either."

"I shouldn't have to. You're the one who needs to apologize."

"I should apologize for you not trusting me?"

Another five minutes and two red lights go by before we turn onto the tree lined street that she lives on. We ease down the winding driveway and she opens the garage. When she parks and turns off the engine ... we both sit there in silence. I see her turn her head toward me out of the corner of my eye and look at her. Her eyes are bright and clear in the overhead lights in the garage, but there's also a spark of anger there. "You should apologize for not trusting me," she says. "because I've never given you a reason not to. I supported your decision to date Mark even though it killed me. After your surgery, even though I knew what it felt like to touch you, I supported you when you wanted to live with Mark. It cut me a little inside every time I would come and visit you and see how domesticated and perfect your little apartment was and I wanted to be him, but I still came so you would know that I wasn't going anywhere. If I could only be your friend, then I was going to be the best god damn friend you'd ever had. So why in the hell couldn't you tell me that you were living with Addison? After everything else you've put me through ... hearing that ... would have been a piece of cake.

"But you didn't tell me because you don't trust me. And it's apparently very easy for you to accuse me of not trusting you even though I trusted you enough to get through your straight girl freak out in Miami and believe in what you felt for me enough to start this thing with you." She opens the car door and snatches the keys from the ignition. She's not looking at me now. She's staring down at her hands. "Maybe I should give up. Maybe I should let you go your way and I can go mine. Then -"

"Don't say that." My heart wedges into my throat and I choke on it. "I'm sorry. I know that you keep -"

"You know what ... I'm not doing this right now."

"If you're going to break up with me then do it! Right now!"

"I HAVE SURGERY IN A FEW HOURS AND I AM TIRED!"

She gets out of the car without another word.

When you get everything in the world that you ever wanted ... when you find the person that you can picture getting old with ... when you fall so far into love that you don't want to climb back out even when it's hard ... the prospect of losing that can hit you like a sledgehammer.

It does hit you like a sledgehammer. You know, if Thor was wielding it like an angry fist and kept pummeling you with it.

It hits me so hard that I can't move at all. I don't even try.

I sit in the car and cry until I can't cry anymore and then I go into the house and sit on the sofa.

I fall asleep sitting upright with my head down and wake up with her easing me onto my back. I'm so exhausted that I'm only vaguely aware of her taking off my shoes and covering me with a blanket, but I know that she kisses me on the forehead. I know that her hand smoothes over my hair when she does it and she kisses longer than a friend would. I can't fight off the chains of sleep, though, and they pull back into a dreamless slumber that makes me not hear the garage door open again or realize that she has left for work. When I finally do wake up, it's because of my cell phone and I'm shocked to see that I've missed several calls and texts. They're all from Addison. In varying degrees of hysteria, she has left me numerous apologies that range from truly emotional begging to angry finger pointing ... to pleas to ignore the last message because she wasn't thinking and she didn't mean it. In every voice mail, she's crying and I can barely understand her. I still listen to all ten of them and try to decipher what she's saying. Most of the texts are so long that they were chopped into two or three separate ones.

The gist of it ... is that I'm her only real friend in Seattle and she loves me.

I went through most of my life not being anyone's friend and now I'm the only one that two women have. I feel that this could explain why I'm not very good at it.

I'm shocked to see that it's approaching noon. As I shake off the last shackles of semi-consciousness, I debate what I should do. I'm one of those anal people who will make a Pro and Con list in my head and keep a running tally of it to help me with big decisions. On the one hand, I could wait at Erica's place for her to come home. I could cook dinner and we could eat it on the deck where there's enough open space for our problems to fly free. On the other hand, I could wait at Erica's place for her to come home, cook dinner, and then have her tell me it's over which would obliterate me. I can just imagine what it would feel like to stand on the front porch and wait for a cab knowing that she's inside.

So, my options are to leave in a cab with my dignity intact or ... leave with none. I go into the kitchen to get a bottle of water and draw up short. There's a note on the island and a box of ... Pop Tarts sitting next to it. Erica takes food very seriously. She looks at labels, counts up sodium and carbs and preservatives with the same kind of passion that I don't ... so for her to even buy a box of jumbo sized Pop Tarts in assorted flavors confirms in my head that she is not only dumping me ... she's hoping I kill myself with food while she does it. I pick up the note anyway.

Callie,

I should be home at 5:00.

Please hang around. We need to talk .

E

That is not happening.

Nope.

If she's got something to say to me she can damn well say it now as opposed to later.

Her phone goes straight to voice mail when I try to call, but I don't leave a message. I call a cab, grab my purse, and lock up her house while I wait on the porch. The sun is shining, which feels like God thumbing his nose at me. If any day should be hazy and overcast, it's today. If any day should be rainy, this is a good one because if it ends the way I imagine, I need to sit in the rain and pray that it washes me away, too. My cab eventually arrives and I climb in the backseat, asking the driver to take me to Seattle Grace. On the drive, that damn Leona Lewis song comes on the radio and I ask for it to be turned off. I see the driver glance back at me, but I don't comment beyond that and he complies with my request.

I'm not having a straight girl freak out now.

I'm also not having a gay girl freak out.

I'm having a very real human freak out that ... complete with rib thumping heart beats, paranoia, and the urge to open my purse and breathe into it because breathing sunshine is breaking me.

My nerves are definitely on edge when I get to the hospital. My first stop is the attending's lounge on a whim, to see if she's there. Naturally, she's not, so I go to the most obvious place and check the surgical board. She's been in the OR for two hours and it's booked for four. I head into the gallery to watch and I'm shocked to see that Cristina is sitting on the front row instead of working on the case. Webber said that Hahn had to teach her, but the look on Cristina's face when she glances at me tells me that Erica isn't making many, if any, concessions. Cardio usually draws in a standing room only crowd, but there's only two other people watching. One is Lexie Gray and the other is George. He gives me a small grin and moves his feet so that I can walk past him. I sit down next to Cristina, who is at the far end, and say, "Why aren't you helping out?"

"Apparently," Cristina says, "My Beverly Hills blood prevents me from being a good heart surgeon. I need to move into a trailer and let it traumatize me and bring it up all the time so that I can a little respect."

"What do you mean?"

"I was on the board to help Hahn. Me. And then Stevens appears and starts babbling about how she has nothing to do and asks if she can help us out." Cristina narrows her eyes as she looks down into the OR. "Cardio is mine, but Stevens started talking to the patient and sympathizing with her because it was so hard to get her out of her trailer and she understands because she grew up in one. Then your girlfriend started rhapsodizing about hers so hilarity ensued while they all swapped horror stories and I just stood there. Stevens scrubbed in and Hahn told me that I could observe from the floor or the gallery and she'd happily answer any questions that I have."

I keep my eye on the OR. Izzie is standing shoulder to shoulder with Erica and whatever they're talking about has them both laughing as they work together.

The most disturbing aspect is that Erica's polka dotted scrub cap is back. She's not using the one I gave her.

That's a sign.

That has to be a sign.

Cristina nudges me on the leg and points toward the other end of the room. I glance that way and see that George and Lexie have their heads together and are talking and giggling like school kids. "Meredith told me that Izzie is taking their new ... thing ... really hard."

There's a thing between George and Lexie? I'd pretty much call that karma for Stevens.

I reach past Cristina and turn on the speaker so we can hear the exchange in the OR.

Erica is laughing just as hard as she does with me. "You have got to be kidding me," she says.

"Nope," Izzie replies. "It taught me everything I needed to know about cooking."

"You like to cook, too?"

I see Izzie's head bob up and down. "Oh my god, I love to cook! Bake, specifically. You know, before I donated money for the Denny Duquette Memorial Clinic, I thought about opening up a bed and breakfast somewhere and just cooking for people. It makes me happy. It's healthier than takeout."

I see Erica turn to look at her and I can tell that she's smiling under her mask because her eyes crinkle at the edges. "That would be amazing."

My ears eventually clog with rage and I stop listening to the incessant chatter of recipes and the merits of sage. Erica hands the reins to Izzie and leans over her shoulder to watch her work. It shouldn't affect me in the least, but so help me ... it does. I have no idea what they're doing to the heart, but I know exactly what they're doing to mine. There are scenarios in life where you can't stop yourself from acting on impulse and this ... this is one of those for me. I get to my feet and press the microphone, "Erica?"

She turns and looks up at me and waves. "Hey! What are you -"

"I was just wondering if the patient was hooked up to an LVAD at the moment."

Erica nods up at me. "Yes, she is, but it's only a temporary -"

"You deserve a big gold star for bravery. Or possibly the gold in stupid."

"Excuse me!?" she snaps and I see her back straighten the same way mine did when Addison slapped me.

"You operated on Denny Duquette, remember? He threw a clot and died after his heart transplant."

"This isn't a transplant. Do you have something to say about my technique?" she asks, her voice tight.

"No," I reply. "I have something to say about the people you let operate with you. Denny Duquette wasn't sick enough to move up the transplant list so the person currently holding the sharp things down there ... she cut his LVAD wire and-"

"CALLIE!" George gets to his feet, but I ignore him.

"Stevens cut his LVAD wire," I repeat. "to make him sicker. The Hippocratic oath means nothing to her and it's either very brave or very stupid for you to give her a chance ... I just haven't decided which yet."

I turn the speaker off so that I can't hear her reply.

George rushes out of the room, followed by Lexie.

"Callie?"

"What, Cristina?"

"You can move back in with me. Anytime."

"Thanks."

When I was twelve, Jasper broke my Walkman. He was only two and he shadowed me so much that he would run into my back if I stopped walking without warning. That was the first time that I learned how much better it is to control your temper. He stood there in his shorts with his bare toes curled up because pieces of my Walkman were all over the place in the floor ... and I pushed him down. I think it hurt his feelings more than it hurt his diaper clad butt because I was yelling when I pushed and still yelling when he fell, but I didn't help him up. I called him a 'brat' and grabbed up the pieces to go and show my Dad. Jazz didn't tell that I pushed him down. He was crying so hard that he couldn't say anything except 'I sorry'. It wasn't enough for me. I called him a 'fucking brat' and my mother spanked my fucking ass until I was crying, too. Jazz came and hugged me when it was over and I saw the bruise on the back of his thigh where he had fallen on part of the Walkman. I let him sleep with me that night because I felt so bad and he snuggled against me and told me it was 'kay now'.

The second time I learned about controlling my temper was when I was seventeen. Joel had just turned twenty one and my parents, because they were idiots I think, decided to leave him in charge of the house while they took a couple's cruise to the Bahamas. My brother may be a preacher now, but he was definitely NOT then. He had the party to end all parties and didn't say a single thing when his college buddies started asking me all sorts of perverted questions. I took Jazz upstairs and we played Nintendo until the racket died down and then we snuck out for pizza and ice cream. I drove my Dad's car and put a nice long scratch down the side because I wasn't used to driving it. When my parents got home ... there was no sign of a party, but my Dad saw the damage to his car and demanded answers. Naturally, Joel blamed me which wasn't incorrect, but I fired back about the party and how I had to drive Daddy's car because mine was blocked. Joel opened his mouth and called me a 'lying bitch' and I went across the dining room table at him so fast that I scattered food, shattered plates, and knocked him backward in his chair. I think I ripped out a majority of his hair and I know that the reason my hand was sore for two weeks was because I broke his nose, but that didn't matter.

It took the crack of my father's belt on Joel's backside to make him stop choking me (a very low point) and after Joel stormed out in humiliation because he was, after all, twenty one ... my Dad told me to go wait for him in his study. I was convinced that I was going to be humiliated as well, but he didn't hit me. He told me that he was disappointed, which sucked, and that my temper needed a new outlet. He gave me a shovel and told me to go dig a hole in the sand that was big enough for my anger. I told him I'd still be digging when I was thirty and he told me to get started. I dug for two days and when my hands were split open from the blisters and I my shoulders had matching ones from the sun ... I stopped digging. I wasn't very mad anymore. He had watched me off and on for those two days and when I drove the shovel into the sand and left it there ... he walked onto the beach and looked inside the hole.

"Is that how much anger you have?" he had asked.

"Yeah."

"You want to tell me why?"

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

"Then fill it back up."

Let me just tell you that if I had known I'd be filling it back up ... I would have stopped after two shovel fulls instead of digging a freaking mote across the backyard. It only took me a day to get it covered back in and that was because Jasper came out and helped me. He kneeled down in the sand on his bony knees and pushed and pushed as much as he could with his bare hands. "Callie, why did you dig up the yard? Did you lose something?"

I said, "I guess I lost my head."

Jasper stopped pushing. "Heads don't come off."

"They do when you're mad."

"Don't get mad. I like your head." He went back to helping me and I went back to shoveling.

From that day on ... I would dig something, literally or figuratively, before I'd truly let myself go. I fell a few times. Shoving Meredith Grey into the lockers because I wanted to kick her ass and trying to beat up a man who had belittled his fiancé into killing herself with diet and exercise were definite low points, but I usually filter myself pretty well. My mouth will still write checks that my ass has a hard time cashing, but I usually think before I do something ... so dumb ... as to announce to Erica Hahn in front of everyone in the OR ... that Izzie Stevens basically killed Denny Duquette.

George finally told me the truth about that fateful LVAD cutting day on our honeymoon in Vegas. He tried to make up for everything he had shut me out of by singing like a bird after we had sex as husband and wife. I finally had to tell him to be quiet because I was exhausted and freaked out by what my parents would do to me when they found out I had eloped, but he kept right on singing. I think I know more about the intern family now than he does because Cristina is a drunk talker.

If I had good sense ... I would have told Erica about Stevens early on ... or not at all.

I walk out of the gallery before Stevens or Erica finish up the patient and I meet Webber on the steps coming up. "You," he snaps. "wait right here. Do not MOVE."

At least I know where George was going when he flew out of the room. He is, after all, the Chief's intern. I broke a major trust by blabbing about Stevens. After he told me ... he pleaded with me never to tell anyone at the hospital what really transpired, but we all had our theories. We pretty much knew, but his confession could go a long way if it was ever revisited.

Like it now has been.

I can't hear what the Chief is saying, but I can hear his voice rumbling in the galley and echoing in the OR through the stairwell.

When the door opens again, he crosses his arms over his chest and says, "My office. Now."

If he has a belt ... I'd prefer him to use that on me than say whatever he is inevitably going to say.

"Sit!" he growls when we're inside. I comply so fast that I hit my tail bone on the arm of the chair and have to grit my teeth against the pain. "Talk."

"About?"

"I'm just trying to judge for myself if you're sane before I yell at you."

"No, sir. I'm not."

"What exactly is the problem?"

When I was standing on the beach with my father and he asked me what I was angry at ... I should have told him that I was angry at me. I should have told him that I wasn't happy with who I was or how people perceived me, or with anything in my life. Over the years ... I've wished a thousand times to relive that moment and say everything that I was feeling at the time. Richard Webber reminds me so much of my Dad sometimes that it's scary. "I'm involved with Erica."

"I gathered as much from watching her act like a crazed lunatic while you were stuck in the elevator and if that wasn't enough to make me suspect it then the fact that she kissed you certainly was. Correct me if I'm wrong, but have you not also been kissing her?"

"Yes, I have."

"Then how is the fact that you're involved with Erica a problem?"

He's giving me the same look that my Dad can give me to make me invent answers. I don't have to here, though. "I'm scared of her. I'm scared of what I feel for her. In case you haven't noticed ... in the past year I got a divorce, moved in with Mark, fooled around with Erica, moved out of Mark's place and ... well, now she wants a commitment. She wants me to move in with her."

"And you don't want that?"

"No, I do."

He puts his head in his hands. "At the risk of sounding redundant ... what exactly is the problem?"

"Precisely."

"How, pray tell, did all of this motivate you to announce that Dr. Stevens cut Denny Duquette's LVAD wire?"

"We already established that I'm not quite sane."

"I'm not amused."

"Me either."

"You have quite a few issues."

"No, sir. I have subscriptions."

He actually smiles a little. "To what, exactly?"

"Madam-was-Hell."

He laughs now and shakes his head. Before he can speak, his door is shoved open and there's only one person I know who would be brave enough to just barge in without knocking. I know it's her. I can sense Erica Hahn from all the way across the country, okay? I felt her the entire time I was in Miami for Jasper's birthday. I stiffen and close my eyes when she slams the door. "Was that true?" she demands. "Callie?"

Richard clears his throat. "I dealt with Dr. Stevens accordingly, Erica."

"No, I don't think you did. If she cut a patient's LVAD wire, which by the way caused my patient to die two days later because he actually was in desperate need, then she should not be practicing medicine." She flops down in the chair beside mine and I glance at her out of the corner of my eye. Yanking her scrub cap off, she leans forward and glares at Richard. "Is it true?"

"I don't make it a habit of discussing my personnel with anyone other than the Board of Directors."

"If Jameson McCormick on the Board knew about this he would have the teaching accreditation yanked from this hospital so fast that we'd all be out of job."

"Which is why we won't be mentioning it."

"Richard, she falsified medical records and -"

"Stop." He gets to his feet and opens the filing cabinet next to me. He rifles through it and pulls out a file, which he takes back to his seat and flips through when his glasses are in place. "Calliope Torres, MD. As I look through this paperwork I see plenty of glowing letters of recommendation and several comment sheets that are excessively generous from patients. What I do not see, however, is anything about Ambien or alcohol while on the job." He takes his glasses off and looks at Erica. "Assuming that you are Chief one day, Dr. Hahn, you can run your ship any way you see fit. As for me, I have no problem giving my staff the benefit of the doubt. Stevens was punished, the hospital was investigated, and I was never able to get a real confession of any wrongdoing nor was I able to locate a severed LVAD wire. Dr. Torres was just telling me that she assumed that the gossip surrounding the incident was true, but she did not hear or see anything firsthand. Is that correct, Dr. Torres?"

He moves his thumb over my file. Cristina can't blackmail worth a damn compared to this master. "Yes, sir."

"Now then," he says, getting to his feet. I watch him put my file away and close the cabinet, locking it. "You two are not to come out of here until whatever issues, or subscriptions you have, have been cancelled. Got it?"

Erica watches him leave. "Subscriptions?"

"Don't ask." I lean back in my chair, stretching my legs out in front of me to get comfortable for the long haul. "Just say it."

"It."

"I'm not waiting until five o'clock for you to break up with me. I'm just ... not. Say it's over so I can go."

She gets to her feet and walks to the window, looking outside. The sun is still shining to spite me. "Is that what you want, Cal?"

"Does it matter?"

"Do you know? What you want?"

"I want you. I always have."

She adjusts the blinds, letting the light bathe her. I wonder if it's because she's as cold inside as I am. "What you said about Stevens is true, isn't it?"

"Yes."

She nods. "Why didn't you tell me before now?"

"Because you weren't flirting with her until now. And why aren't you wearing the cap I gave you?"

She smiles out the window, but I see it. I absolutely see it and it makes me so mad that I can't stand it. I look away, concentrating on the artwork over the Chief's desk. Erica returns to her seat and says, "I saw you when you came into the gallery."

"So?"

"I was trying to get under your skin."

"What were you doing when you were bonding with her over trailer park love?"

"I was getting under Cristina's skin. Look at me." She waits for me to make eye contact before she adds, "I should break up with you. Trying my patience seems to be your favorite pastime and you don't know what you want. You make me feel like crap when you come and go from my life and you take me for granted and you don't listen to me about your health ... but I wouldn't change you. And that's what I've been trying to do. I've been trying to make you change your living arrangements, the way you eat ... everything. I've been acting like your mother ... you were right last night."

She never ever does the things that I expect. Never. She always surprises me. I don't know if this is how real love is supposed to be. All I know is that she stops herself, when she is pissed, from latching onto my jugular with her words. My father used to say that love was patient and kind when my mother would piss him off. He told me once that he needed to get those words tattooed to his chest to remind him to be careful with her. She could test the patience of a saint. I could too ... and yet ... Erica Hahn doesn't let me walk over her, but she doesn't expect to walk over me either. There's a level of respect her that is humbling. Our worst fights ... she can turn on a dime and not be Hurricane Hahn or Attila the Hahn. She's nothing like she is professionally. This is really her. This is the person that I brought out with my heart ... and I don't value her enough.

"I've been acting like a child. You were right about that, too." I reach over and take her hand. She doesn't pull away , but I still hang on tight. "Before you came in here ... I told Richard that you scare me. I thought that I was in love with George, I really did, but I wasn't. He never made me feel the way you do and it's terrifying because if I didn't love him ... then how could he hurt me so much ... and what will you do to me?"

"I won't do anything to you." She covers my hand with both of hers. "Callie, it's not fair to me to let anyone in your past affect us. I'm not George. I'm not Mark ... thank God. Don't use them as any kind of standard to judge us by ... because you can't. And you can't spend your life worrying 'what if' because 'what can' will be gone before you know it. Don't be scared of me, baby. Be scared of everything but me."

"Why aren't you wearing your beach cap?"

"Because I left at home. I don't leave it in my locker because it means too much to me."

I give her a smile and she returns it. "Erica, if I tell you that I'm ready to move in with you ... are you going to think it's because I'm homeless or are you going to think I really want to?"

"You're not homeless."

"Well, no. Cristina pretty much idolizes me after my big announcement in the gallery so I could go back there, but ... I don't want to."

Her eyes move over my face. "Do you want to stay in my guestroom ... or do you want to live in my bedroom?"

"I want to live. I only do that with you."

I watch her eyes fill with tears and lean toward her. She happily meets me halfway. As far as kisses go ... I'd rank it a ten.

As far as interruptions go ... I'd rank Webber's a four.

He come in, grabs his glasses, and rushes back out without looking at us.

We laugh the way we always do. Our eyes on each other like no one else in the world could possibly get the joke ... or the joy we bring to one another. I think maybe the rest of the world can't get it. I still don't get it. I wasn't even looking for love when she came into my life. I didn't expect it or think I needed it. I was jaded, cynical, and biased about anything that involved the heart, but she opened my eyes. This is what people are supposed to have with one another. Whether it's a boyfriend, girlfriend, a husband, wife, or ... partner. Everyone is supposed to feel the way that I do with her. I mean, shit ... every fucking song on the radio is suddenly about me in some way and the stupid chick flicks that she loves mean a hell of a lot more to me than they ever did before.

I'm understanding love.

I'm bleeding love.

Fucking Leona Lewis!

I wonder if her whole CD is on iTunes.

Erica gets off work early and drives me to the Archfield to get my things. I make her promise that she won't hit Addison, pull her hair, kick, bite or scratch. In short, I tell her to keep her hands to herself because if anyone deserved to be slapped ... it was me. What I said to Addison about the baby she aborted was low. It was lower than low and it crossed a line, yet she apologized to me. I don't tell Erica about the baby, but the conviction in my voice when I tell her that I would have hit someone who said it to me seems to make her stop channeling Rocky and the image of her pounding frozen slabs of beef in a meat locker finally flits out of my mind. I kiss her in the elevator the way I did the night before, but we stop when the door opens and an elderly woman looks scandalized enough to pee in her pants. She sniffs like she smells something dirty and I'm tempted to ask her if she still gets laid, but I refrain.

My mood has done a complete about face. If I'm being honest I will have to admit that it's not just Erica ... I also have a small granule of satisfaction due to the fact that Izzie Stevens left work in tears the same way I did many, many times because of her. I tried to look like I felt really guilty for it because George was glaring at me, but I'm not that great of an actress. Really, I'm not. Freakin' Meryl Streep, who I really like ... she could play me in a movie and still not erase the little bit of smug I have on my face after something so gratifying as that. It's nice.

In the hallway outside the room I was sharing with Addison, I look at Erica and say, "Do not hurt her feelings. I did that already and she has been apologetic as hell."

"Can I just threaten her once?"

"No."

"Fiiiiine, but if she hits you again ... ever ... the gloves are off."

I unlock the door and step inside.

I notice two things at once.

All the clothing that I had flung left and right in an attempt to find something decent to wear to dinner has been folded neatly and stacked on my bed.

Her side of the room has been stripped bare. All the shoes, purses, and Coach luggage ... it's gone.

"Addy!" I head across the room and check the bathroom. Never has one person used as much counter space as Addison Forbes Montgomery ... and the only thing there now is my hairspray, toothbrush, and deodorant. "Fuck!"

I pull my phone from the bottom of my purse and realize that I silenced it earlier in the day.

There are two texts.

One is another heartfelt apology.

The second is one line. "Going to California."

I press her speed dial number and it goes straight to voice mail. "Addison, don't leave," I say. "Please don't leave. I'm sorry about everything, too, and I - I need you here. Call me back."

I sit on the bed and wait for fifteen minutes. I also send about a text a minute to her.

No reply comes.

Erica sits down next to me when I start to cry, but it doesn't help.

When your best friend becomes your lover it's a blessing and a curse. You can't really go to your best friend anymore to complain that your girlfriend is making you crazy. An invisible line goes up and while you don't acknowledge it and you pretend that everything is exactly the same ... it's really not. You still need someone who can listen to you rant about love, sex, and mind numbing shit that only matters to a platonic friend. There are levels of friendship between women that men can't infiltrate and lovers can't touch. Addison may not be my best friend and Naomi is hers, but we have something. We have a bond that started when a pregnant woman broke her arm in the shower and lost her baby after that. We cried together that day, we laughed together after that, I gave her advice, she gave me advice ... and in the friendship tier ... she's not the 'best' ... she's the greatest.

There are four people in my small circle of friends who I would lay my life down for tomorrow.

Erica is the most remarkable woman I've ever know and if there is a God ... I hope he lets me go before her because I can't imagine a life without her for a second. I love her more than I ever dreamed I could love anyone. I'm in love with her.

Cristina has truly been good to me. Snappy, but good. I understand her quirks and she deals with my qualms. I love her and I think in her own little Yang way ... she loves me, too. We get it. We know what it is to be a cynic trapped in a world of hope where we believe that we can save lives.

Mark has picked me up and taught me how to walk again when I was crawling through despair. He made me remember that I was beautiful after George took that from me. I love him as a person, as a man, as a friend that I want back in my life so much I can't stand it.

And Addison Montgomery is the first female friend I have ever had. The very first. She's the only woman I know who understands 'lines of deliciousness' and thinks that bathroom humor may be the funniest component of any movie. She's kind and generous and flawed and she's like me in a lot of ways, but as different as she can be. And I would happily go to jail for her again with absolutely no complaints if I could make her understand what she means to me.

We all come into the world alone.

If we're lucky ... when we go out ... we have a circle of people who will mourn, reminisce, and keep our memory alive. They'll remember the times we touched their lives instead of the times we hurt them.

I'm beginning to wonder if I can touch anyone.

Or if I'm destined to hurt so hard that I'll carry the pain of it for the rest of my life ... whether they forgive me for it or not.


	14. Chapter 14

Packing up my things and moving yet again could not be harder.

I grew up with roots and I dug those roots up and never planted them again.

Erica had no roots at all, but she has them now. I can't wait to let her show me how to do the same.

We have to stop and buy clothes hangers and she assures me that the plastic blue ones are the best ones. I have no clue what to choose. Remember when there were only wire hangers? Hell, I guess 'Mommy Dearest' got her wish in the end because I didn't see a single wire hanger in stock. I bought enough blue ones to hang up everything, even my socks if I want to, and followed her in my car to her place. When she gets there, she opens both sides of the garage so that I can park next to her. It's the first time that I've parked in the garage at all. She parked my SUV in there when my family visited, but I usually just leave it in the driveway. It's like ... damn ... my Range Rover has a home, too. One that will keep it out of the wind and rain the same way that Erica does for me. Even if we're outside in a storm ... she acts like an umbrella for me and ... SHIT ... now that damn Rhianna song is stuck in my head. Ella ella ella eh eh eh. If I ever download that as a ring tone I will shoot myself in head ead ead eh eh eh.

She helps me unpack and hang everything up. There are two oversized walk in closets in the master bedroom and she tells me I can share with her or use the empty one. She opens her closet door, though, and points at all the empty space so I go that route, hanging my jeans across from her neat row of dressy pants and my sexy, cleavage baring shirts across from her more conservative choices. Most of my wardrobe is black, dark blue, and jewel tones. Most of hers is beige, brown, and patterned. The clothing of mine that she hung up looks like it just left the dry cleaners, but the pieces I hung up are wrinkled and I hope nothing smells bad because I was embarrassed to tell her that I can't remember what's clean and what's dirty. I'm also kind of embarrassed to tell her that I have more stuff in a small storage unit, but she's going to eventually wonder why I randomly vanish and come back with a few things at a time. There was no room at Cristina's for anything beyond clothing and well ... I didn't live to be thirty three without collecting a few things here and there.

She doesn't bat an eyelash when I tell her. She simply asks me if it will all fit in my vehicle or if we'll need hers, too. "It'll fit in mine," I reply.

"You want some help?"

"Are you tired?"

"Not at all." She wads up the last garbage bag and walks around the bed to where I'm standing. She kisses my cheek, then leans her forehead against mine. "I'm only going to ask this one time and then I'm done. Are you sure this is what you want?"

I take her face in both of my hands and kiss her. "I'm sure."

"Good."

I've decided that my stomach needs a name of its own. It likes to makes it presence known in the most awkward moments and the sounds that it makes are mortifying. Right now ... right now it's growling like Cujo did in the movie. It's horrible. And loud. When I do a mental inventory of the last time I ate ... it was technically two days ago with Erica and I'm wishing I had devoured that Death by Chocolate right about now. I grimace and look at her, "You didn't happen to accidentally give me a mouth in there when you were operating did you? Because it sure can sing."

"I hear it."

I put a hand over my shirt, looking down at my stomach, and say, "Shhh! We're having a moment here."

"Tell me that you've eaten today."

Or ... not. "I don't have a ton of stuff. It should only take about an hour to get it."

"Oh, that's nice. And what did you have for breakfast?"

Or ... okay. "I slept through it."

"How about lunch?"

"Not yet."

"Callie!"

"It's very hard to eat and grovel at the same time, Erica, and I'm very happy that I groveled instead."

"You did not grovel."

"In my own special way ... I most certainly did."

"We'll go out for dinner ... how's that?"

I give her a impish grin. "Only if I can wear a dress again and you do that thing under that table that -"

"Oh, honey," she says sadly, shaking her head. "You will grovel in so many ways before I do that again."

"Shit."

"Let's go." She takes my hand and starts to head into the hallway, but I linger in the doorway, looking back. "What is it?"

I take in the picture over the bed, my photo on the end table, and the blue comforter that is so soft and soothing that I could sleep under it for hours. I look at the painting between the two closets and the arched window and I decide that I've never been in a prettier place before. In my life or my location. "I was just thinking ... I get to call this 'our' room now."

Putting her arms around my waist, she looks at everything over my shoulder like she's trying to see it through my eyes. "Does that mean I get to call you 'mine'?"

"Well, I've been that all along."

It takes us ten minutes to get out the door and into my car because when you say something like that ... making out is required. At least the first base kind of kissing that makes you strain for second with enough effort that you get a charley horse and then get benched. She shuts me down when I try to take her shirt off and I realize that she's still on her period. I will be making us BOTH appointments to get on Depo Provera to stop this monthly madness. This? This is easily the worst part about being a woman in a same sex relationship. There's PMS and days of no sex that seem to stretch for years. It doesn't amuse me. But then it does because there isn't a boyfriend alive who understands PMS, cramps, bloating, or boob aches. I wouldn't trade it if I could.

We stop at Chili's before we head to the storage unit. I pass on the baby back ribs, pass on the burger, don't look twice at the fajitas ... and ask for a salad. She looks impressed until I tell the waiter to make sure the chicken is fried and that I have enough honey mustard to bathe in. When he walks away, she takes my hand across the table. "It's a start," she says. "I guess I need to realize that underneath that mountain of flour, grease, and dressing there are some vegetables."

"I'll eat your freakin' oatmeal in the morning to make up for it. I discovered that it comes with peaches and cream. So, I can eat fruits and mushy crap and totally rock your world."

"There are other things you eat that rock my world, Callie."

I choke on my Coke.

It burns.

So does the spot between my legs where she rests her foot, grinding just enough to make me not enjoy my fried chicken salad in the least.

She watches me closely, doing things with her straw that should be illegal.

I hate her table manners, I decide. Not just because her foot is rudely invading my bubble (oh, all right, I can't hate that), but she's molesting the silverware, too, stroking it with her long white fingers until my fork clatters to the table twice. She finally takes a little pity on me and stops with the silverware sex ... but her foot stays in place until we pay.

I'm so hot and bothered when we leave that I'm ready to beg her to slip into the backseat with me and make my body do tricks for her that it ONLY does with her. I can go from zero to orgasm with her in half the time it has ever taken me before. I'm not going to overanalyze it, but I think the fact that she has matching parts gives her insight that is unimaginable. There isn't a boyfriend alive who can do that thing she does with her tongue ... God, how am I going to carry boxes when it's a struggle to balance at all? I'm already walking kinda bowlegged. Thinking of her tongue causes me to bite mine, but the pinch of pain doesn't help.

I want her.

Bad.

I somehow manage to drive us to the storage place without doing any damage and I park in the spot right in front of the small building that I rent. It's not much larger than the closet we're sharing at her house, but the contents here are a lot more valuable than my clothes. I've got pictures, scrapbooks, and so much of me to take home. I unlock the door and lift the back hatch of my car, going around to let the seat down. Erica joins me and says, "If you own this much luggage then why on earth do you have so many Glad garbage bags?"

"Because this is Louis Vuitton and I hate labels." I grab the nearest suitcase and load it into the car. She follows suit and we work our way through half the area before my phone rings. I pull it out of my pocket and gasp, answering. "Addison?"

"Hey."

"Where are you?"

"California. Are you - are you okay?"

"You don't hit that hard," I reply, adjusting my Bose radio on top of a suitcase. "I'm sorry for what I said to you. I don't know what the hell I was thinking. You're not moving back to California are you?"

"Well, that was sorta the plan."

"Sorta?"

"You know the fireman that I mentioned?"

I stop securing the lid on a box. "The one who likes you?"

"Yeah. He was killed in a fire. Naomi called me yesterday and I started packing for the funeral ... and, well, I packed everything."

"Oh my god! Addy! I'm so sorry."

"Thank you."

"Do you need me to come?"

"No ... actually ... Mark came with me."

My lack of a response is the best that I can do and it obviously speaks volumes.

"Cal?"

"Hmm?"

"I told him about Alex. He's mad as hell at me, but he's still here. All my things are at his apartment. He showed up at the Archfield when the bellhop was loading my luggage and he refused to let me bring it to California. We went to his place and left it and he packed a bag to come with me." She takes a deep breath. "I think maybe he wants to try for something now. You know ... assuming that he gets over the Alex thing which is only about thirty minutes old in his time."

"You just told him?"

"Yep." She sighs now. "Callie?"

"What?"

"Are you okay with this?"

"I'm fine with it. I really am. Just ... don't hurt him."

"I can make that deal if you won't let your girlfriend hurt me. She's terrifying. When I told her that I hit you ... well, let's just say that I'm gonna be watching over my shoulder for a blond butcher for about two years before I feel comfortable again." She laughs and I join her, glancing over at Erica, who is still hard at work. "At the same rate though ... you need to watch out for Mark. I mentioned what you told me about the baby and the flower and ... well, you should watch over your shoulder for a while, too. He's pissed. He was gonna call you, but I wouldn't let him."

"Thank you for that."

"You and me? We're still friends. I don't care what anyone says. Okay?"

"Always." I let my eyes wander over Erica's backside as she reaches across two stacked boxes. Her pants are pulled tight and I can see her panty line. Unless I'm much mistaken, those damn blue panties are back. They're the only pair in her collection, and I think I've seen them all but not in a dirty 'let me paw through your panty drawer' kind of way, that hug her ass just so. Addison continues to talk, changing gears and mentioning the eternal sunshine in California, but I can only fill the pauses with grunts and forced laughter. Erica rubs her hands over her backside as she reaches for another box and it causes me to groan.

"You okay?" Addison asks.

"I'm moving in with Erica."

"And it makes you sound like that? Does she scare you, too?"

The next sound I make is a strangled cry. From a box I had forgotten I had ... Erica pulls out the biggest, purplest dildo to ever see the light of day. I drop the phone and accidentally hang up on Addison in my haste to catch it before it can hit the ground. I take a flying leap across the small area to prevent Erica from digging any deeper into my toy chest, but it's too late. From the depths of my depravity, which incidentally happens to be the largest box here, she pulls out a set of handcuffs, a whip, and a leather bustier that leaves nothing to the imagination. She starts to laugh when she looks up at me. "Holy shit, Callie. I'm starting to think that maybe you have a dirtier mind than me and that's hard to do."

Oh.

My.

God.

She dumpster dives again and pulls out a pair of vibrating panties that malfunctioned on me just when they were getting good. I thought that my clit had been electrocuted, but it turned out to be a wire that came through. Yeah, not fun. "Erica -"

"What is this?"

Oh.

My.

Holy.

God.

In.

Heaven.

She has found THE TONGUE.

It even has a nose.

Wrinkling her own nose, she shakes it a little, watching the Pepto Bismol colored pink tongue flap up and down. The worst part is coming. Any minute now she's going to see the adapter. I watch as comprehension dawns on her and I contemplate lowering the roll up door on my head to just make it all stop. She howls with laughter when she sees the end of the cord. I knew she would. I try to blend into the wall when she makes the tongue flap at me like a flag of crazy in straight line wind. "CALLIE!" she wheezes. "TELL ME YOU NEVER DID THIS WHILE DRIVING! IT PLUGS INTO THE LIGHTER!? HAHAHAHAHAH!"

The phone in my hand rings and I answer fast, relieved to have something to do. "Hello?"

Addison says, "Did you hang up on me?"

"No, sorry. Bad connection." I watch Erica reach into the box yet again and when she pulls out the French Maid outfit ... my mortification is so complete that my brain won't let me carry on any form of communication beyond, "Addy, can I call you back?"

"Sure. I'll be here."

I hang up and pretend that the life history of my vagina's playthings are not on display like a museum exhibit. I pick up a box and put it in my car, taking far too long to make sure it's just so and when I turn around ... Erica is on her feet. She's watching me with a look of amusement that gives me plenty of warning that she's about to rub it in. "Callllllie."

"None of that is mine," I lie. "I was ... uhm ... that must be George's stuff."

"George, huh?" From behind her back, she holds up a straight jacket. "You're the only person I know who needs this. And check it out ... built in nipple clips."

Damn that straightjacket. I never should have stolen that from my ex. "Hmm, how'd that get in there? As a matter of fact, I've never seen any of this before in my life. I'll need to talk to management because apparently someone left it here."

"The Sex Fairy? Dirty Santa? The Orgasm Bunny?"

"Ha ha."

She walks toward me like a tiger stalking its prey. She doesn't stop until I'm forced to sit down on the back bumper of the car. She tosses the straightjacket in behind me and kisses me, moving between my legs as her thumbs brush against my nipples, which naturally ... are hard as rocks. "Tonight ... when we get home ... you're gonna have to demonstrate how some of this works because I've never seen such an assortment in my life and ... curiosity may kill me if you don't."

"You're not freaking out."

"My collection is not as ... diverse ... as yours, but I'll gladly share."

If lust could be classified as a disease ... it would be terminal for me.

She's going to be the death of me.

When she makes sure that the box containing my vast assortment of vibrating, twirling, and rotating ... things ... gets loaded last and therefore will be the first box to come out of the car ... I wish that I had the power to teleport. No, I wouldn't send myself off to some far off place to hide ... I'd zap us straight to our bedroom and show her a thing or two about how I can dance.

Hmm, that has potential.

I slide behind the wheel and start the engine, then drive to the main office and put the keys in the night box. When I get back in ... The Tongue is plugged into the ashtray and she's watching it hum with life.

It's going to be a long drive.

We put the boxes and luggage in the guest room because it's getting late. Despite the fact that I slept most of the morning away, I'm exhausted. When the last box is stacked neatly against the wall, I go into the master bedroom and draw up short. My treasure chest, which Erica personally escorted upstairs, is on the floor between the two closets. She's standing at the dresser and I watch her take her earrings off. Her eyes meet mine and there's a flash of devilment when she lets her gaze wander lazily over my reflection. I can't see myself from the current angle, only her, and I could look for days. I can hear water running in the bathtub and I ignore the big sex filled vibrating elephant in the room in favor of touching her. She's tried, and failed, to twist all of her hair into a clip so I take it down and do it for her.

That, in case you're wondering, is one more thing that doesn't suck when you're with another woman. There's no weird tangling of oversized and hairy fingers into earrings, hair scrunchies, or clips. We know how to pull bobby pins without scalping someone and we know how to twist, braid, and secure hair for mundane things like long soaks in the tub or, you know, to expose someone's neck. Which I take full advantage of. The nape of her neck always smells sweet. It doesn't matter if she's just performed surgery ... her skin rejects odor and she always has that delicate, perfect hint of lilacs. I can smell her shampoo today, too. It's vanilla. I bury my nose in her hair while I fasten my lips to her neck and taste her. Her backside moves against my crotch and I know that I've got it bad. I've got it very, very bad.

"Guess what?" she asks.

"What?"

"Someone's coming tomorrow to repair the hot tub."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. And they'll be filling and setting it for us ... so tomorrow night ... anything can happen."

"Anything?"

"Mmmm hmmm." She turns around and kisses me, sliding the clip from my hair with the same ease that I secured hers. "Why don't you go take a bath?"

I glance up at her hair, which I was sure she was putting up to keep from getting it wet. "I thought you were -"

"Later. Go on."

I pick up my bag of toiletries and head into the bathroom. I can smell cherry blossoms and smile when I see that the tub has bubbles in it ... my favorite scent from Bath & Body Works at that. She's put two towels on the sink and her shampoo is on the ledge of the tub. I frown and lift the ends of my hair, smelling it. Maybe she's trying to tell me something. I don't soak for long. It's going to put me to sleep and I really want to make sure before I drift off that I tell her exactly how sorry I am for what I've put her through and how happy I am to be here with her. I wash and rinse ... then wash again for good measure ... and finally step from the tub. I secure my hair under one towel and wrap the other around me after I pat myself dry. I forgot to bring any panties in with me so I deal with just the towel. It's a fluffy and oversized royal blue affair with cream colored accents. Erica doesn't strike me as the type who likes to shop, but I could be wrong. She has excellent taste.

She put my panties in the drawer next to her own. I rifle through it, trying to find my favorite pair.

"Looking for these?" she asks.

My Spiderman boy shorts are dangling off her finger. She's leaning in the doorway and when I nod at her, she crooks that finger slightly. She could toss them, but she doesn't. If she's going to make it hard on me ... I'm going to reciprocate. I pull the towel and from my body and throw it into the hamper, then I take the one from my hair, which I comb my fingers through. When I walk toward her now ... I'm completely naked ... and she's looking at every inch of me. I've never had a problem with being naked. Never. And this isn't an exception. She looks at me like she's seeing me for the first time every time I'm stripped bare. She looks at me like she's seeing something so perfect that she can't look away from it. I don't even care that the scar on my abdomen has turned a purplish color now or that my skin puckers a little. When she looks at it ... I know that she sees her own handiwork and she knows that she saved my life. The scar is proof of that ... and that could never be anything but perfect.

I stop in front of her. So far her eyes have only made it as far as my chest and it's a slow process for her to get to my face. When she does, I smile at her. "Are you going to give me my panties?"

"Why? You're not gonna need them." She reaches up and traces a water droplet, following its path over my nipple, which she circles with her fingertip. "I've been thinking about doing this for days. Since the restaurant, actually. If I had spent the night with you that night ... well ... you wouldn't have gotten much sleep."

"Don't worry. I didn't. I really am so sor-"

She brings her hand up, resting her thumb against my lips. "House rule number one ... you don't have to say what I already know."

"Are there other rules?"

Nodding, she kisses me. "House rule number two ... enjoy yourself."

She gently coaxes me backwards until I fall back on the bed. She comes with me, settling between my thighs as her mouth blazes a path over my throat and collar bone. When she worries my earlobe in her teeth, I hiss and say, "Is your period finally over?"

Pushing herself up a little, she smiles at me. "House rule number three ... it's better to give than receive. I don't have to get off ... to want to get you off. So, be quiet."

"I was very quiet the last couple of times that you got me off ... I'm not making any promises."

"House rule number four ... be very, very loud."

"You're making this up as you go."

"And it's subject to change." Kissing me again, she pulls my legs a little further apart so she can grind against me all the more. "You wanna play with something in your box of toys."

"There is nothing over there that can compare to the real thing."

"Good answer." She slips down to my breasts, nipping and sucking until I urge her lower with my hands on her shoulders. I hear her chuckle at my boldness, but she complies, letting her tongue dance over my belly button.

I jump when she presses her face against the crease of my leg and bites at me. It's a ticklish spot that I never meant for her to find, but I'll be damned if I can hide anything. She worries that spot until I'm laughed out and begging her to stop, then she moves down to my thighs, kissing both of them. She rakes her teeth across my knee and then repeats it on the other one and I finally push myself up on my elbows and glare at her. "Stop. Making. Me. Wait. Yellow."

"This is you groveling, Callie, in your own special way."

I watch her put her finger in her mouth. I was so wrong about the things she does to a straw ... this is sexier. Her lips close around it, heart shaped and perfect. When she finally eases it from her mouth,I lick my own lips in anticipation. Slowly, and with far too much enjoyment at being slow as hell on her part, she eases it into me, curling it slightly. I reach down, grabbing the top of her hair and I don't have to pull hard to get her face between my legs. She goes willingly, parting my flesh with the fingers of her other hand so that her tongue can dance against my clit. She pulls me taut, spreading me open as she traces the bundle of nerves that she has had on edge all night. I watch every single move she makes with her tongue until her blue eyes find mine and hold me. I stay on my elbows and I can't look away from her. She's goooood ... she's hypnotizing.

And just before I get off ... she stops.

She eases her finger out of me and I start to protest, but she shifts her weight and I feel something cold against me.

When whatever it is slides into me and hums to life ... I groan and fall back onto the bed.

I wasn't expecting that, yet I'm not complaining.

I'm also not quiet at all. It's probably a good thing Buddha isn't here because I'd be working him into a frenzy with the sounds I'm making. I'm obviously working her into a frenzy.

Oh. My. God.

She makes me come three times before she slides back up my body and kisses me. "You have the best orgasm face ever," she says.

"Gee ... I wonder why. What the hell was that?" I ask, breathlessly.

Reaching between us, she gently tugs the toy from me and holds it up. "Mine. You didn't have a g-spot stimulator in your bag of tricks. Which, considering that you have everything else perverted, I'm kind of shocked. You really have GOT to tell me all about the French Maid outfit, preferably while you're wearing it."

"Out of everything in that box ... that is what you want to know about?"

She rolls onto her back beside me. "I don't like penis ... fake or otherwise ... and all that phallic stuff you've amassed does nothing for me. No matter how much variety you have."

Great. Now I feel like I've broken some huge rule. It doesn't matter than I haven't technically messed with anything in the box since before George, now I feel like there's something horrible about ... still liking some of the ... phallic stuff. Like you have to completely swear it off when you're with a woman. I didn't get the handbook apparently.

"Callie?" She turns her head toward me and I look at her. "I do, however, like using them. I've already got the biggest dick ever. Might as well strap one on occasionally. You know ... since you do like it."

I feel like I shrink three inches into the mattress. It's not an accusation on her part, but it feels that way. "I - I'm not supposed to like it ... right? I mean, it's against the rules or something?"

"We're gonna make our own rules. If there's something in that box you want to bring into the bed ... I'm not intimidated by it. If you like it ... then like it with me ... and don't go searching for the real thing. But if that day ever comes ... when you need a man and not me ... tell me."

"That's never gonna happen." I roll to face her, my hand on her hip. "When I tell you I love you ... I mean it. I don't just say it to hear myself talk."

"House rule number five," she says. "Use your own lines."

"Here's a few original lines," I reply, leaning forward to kiss her. "I love you. I love you more than I've ever loved anything and you're stuck with me. We're gonna be little old ladies fighting over whose walker is closest to the bed and whose turn it is to go fetch the vitamins and Ensure.

"I've got about ten years on you so I automatically win."

"Yes, but you eat healthier than me. I'm sure I'll be paying by then."

"That's why we need to have kids, baby, because they can do it for us." She stretches and sits up. "I'm gonna go take a shower. I really need to talk to someone about scheduling my surgeries so early. I need a strict 'no cutting before nine' law."

I realize that I'm not breathing when she goes into the bathroom.

She actually just said we need to have kids.

Those little people that she hates.

She said it.

Out loud.

I crawl under the cover and listen to her humming in the shower. Surely she was just talking. There's no way she was remotely serious because she's Erica Hahn.

She thinks about career, me, and sex ... possibly in that order.

I think it's going to be a sleepless night for me, but I'm wrong.

Contentment can and will act like an Ambien if you let it.

There was a soap opera on when I was a teenager. My mother obsessively sat in front of the television watching the lives of people unfold every single day. The Capwell family was rich and powerful, just like mine. One of their daughters, Eden, fell in love with a blue collar cop and they became the most star-crossed lovers ever seen on television. At least to hear my mother tell it. I got roped into watching 'Santa Barbara' during the summers when I had nothing to do, but I secretly enjoyed it. Up until blond haired, blue eyed Eden fell in love with Cruz, who was not only poor, but a gasp ... Latino ..., I had never been invested in love. I rooted for them through their ups and downs and begged my mother to record it while I was school. I saw the kind of relationship that you could have with someone if you overcame the stigmas and broke the barriers. In a way, my relationship mirrors theirs. Erica is the blond haired, blue eyed half of it and she was the poor one. I'm the one who has enough ethnicity on my face to deal with certain stereotypes and enough money to comfort myself over that fact, but the same thing that motivated Cruz and Eden is motivating me. 'In dreams and in love, there are no impossibilities.' That was something they said on the show more than once.

It's something that I firmly believe in now.

Erica doesn't mention children again. Maybe she won't. I don't know.

But the fact that she did mention them means that it's not impossible.

And the fact that I'm finally happy and someone wants to hold my hand means that dreams can come true.

We go into work early and just like I promised Erica I would, I reach for the peaches and cream oatmeal with no coaxing on her part. I even eat it and opt for orange juice as opposed to Coke to wash it down with. We ride the elevator upstairs together and I'm kissing her neck, whispering how much I enjoyed last night, when Stevens walks into the elevator. She looks at me, then at Erica, and shakes her head. Dr. Savoy, who I really can't stand for more reasons than the way he attacked Bailey during Duquette's M&M, comes in next. He looks down at our joined hands and smiles, cloaking it under a cough. "Stevens," he greets, smiling at her.

"Dr. Savoy," Izzie nods at him, then glances back at me.

Savoy looks back as well. In the same tone that he used to greet Izzie, he says, "Lesbians."

"Asshole," I fire back conversationally.

He lets his eyes move over me, then Erica, "Hahn is taller, little more masculine. I'd put my money on her being the guy."

Izzie snorts, "Callie's the one with the shoulder span of a linebacker. I'd say she's the guy."

Savoy shakes his head. "No, she's the pretty one. And she drives stick really, really well."

Okay, when you are an intern and a hotshot young doctor keeps randomly following you into stairwells, telling you how beautiful you are and how much he wants to touch you ... and you can say no ... then you can come and talk to me about me NOT saying no. It happened twice. I smile sweetly at him. "But I don't enjoy it when the ... stick ... resembles incense in size."

The smile fades from his face and he turns to face the doors again. Izzie, however, has scented my agitation and apparently my announcement about the Duquette thing has sparked her rage. Rightfully so, I guess, because that was vicious on my part, but I don't plan on apologizing. "Don't worry," she tells Savoy. "Her ex-husband is my best friend and he told me -"

"Stevens," Erica says, taking a step forward. I move sideways, keeping my hand firmly on hers to pull her back ... just ... in ... case. "One word from your mouth that I don't like is the one word that will tip the scale and have me going to the Hospital Board to talk about Denny Duquette and the blood money that is funding the memorial clinic. Callie's ex-husband, your best friend, told her everything that happened. Everything. So you think about that before you say another word about her. Especially in front of me."

The doors slide open and Izzie leaves. Savoy laughs and says, "Yep, definitely the man," as he follows her.

Erica and I technically should have gotten off on the same floor they did, but the doors slide shut with neither of us moving. When she reaches for the stop button, I nearly panic ... as visions of being stuck again float around in my head. The elevator glides to a smooth stop with no bangs or screeches and I brace myself for an outburst of some kind about Savoy. What she does ... is hug me.

"This isn't a house rule," she tells me, her face against my hair. "This is a life rule. Do not let them see that they're getting to you or they'll always get to you. The only power someone has to get under your skin is the power you give them. Don't rise to the occasion, baby. Just smile and nod."

"You don't smile."

"Well, no, I have perfected the fifty foot death stare at this point." She steps back, cradling my face in her hands. "But you have a great smile and it can disarm the opponent with the same ferocity of my laser beam eyes."

I wrinkle my nose. "Have you been reading my comics?"

"Just the ones on your panties."

When she kisses me, I completely forget that I've made a new enemy out of an old one.

Life rule number two ... never forget.

People have graduated from stupid and are now working towards degrees in Tragic Idiocy Esquire. My dislike of people is reinforced so much as lunchtime approaches, that I'd rather trade in my medical degree for a nice warehouse job somewhere. Or maybe become a postman. As a doctor ... you see everything. You hear everything. You do everything. Being puked on is common. Being called vile names is a near daily occurrence. But I reach an all time low when an aggressive father, who broke his leg during an argument with his daughter's track coach, decides to kick me in the chest when I get just a little too rough with resetting his tibia. To his credit, he starts babbling about how sorry he is the moment it happens. To my credit, I refrain from stabbing my pen in his eye while I bend at the waist and try to breathe. Motherfucker has great aim.

Lexie Grey drew the short stick so she's working on Ortho with me. Interns just don't care too much for bones or whether they mend properly. There's a reason why only three or four percent of all practicing physicians are orthopedic surgeons. It's not valued or widely respected. There are no internal organs to slice, dice, and julienne and the level of complexity in a lot of ortho surgeries deal more with how healthy the patient is as opposed to how much difficulty a rotator cuff can actually give you. Ortho is cut and dried. There are rarely complications or surprises. The skeletal system is the same in nearly everyone. I say nearly because I once assisted on a guy who was born with no ribs. My hand to God ... we made him some.

I feel like my ribcage, and more specifically my sternum, has caved in on my organs and is squeezing the life out of me.

I sit down, arms crossed tightly over my breasts and try to drag in air.

Lexie, who looks too much like Doogie Howser for me to call her Dr. Grey, presses her stethoscope to my back and listens. "Dr. Torres," she says timidly. "do I need to get someone?"

"No." I glance at the bed, where the guy is watching me with a look of apprehension, which he should definitely feel. I may break his leg off and shove it up his ass before all is said and done. The image is comforting. "Think you can hold his good leg down?"

"I think I'd love to try." In a much lower voice, she adds, "That whiny assed dickhead needs to scream."

"Hear hear," I reply, smiling a little. I wonder if she realizes that George can be the most whiny assed dickhead alive. Or ... maybe he's not when he's with her. Maybe that was only when he was with Stevens.

I get to my feet and stretch my shoulders back, groaning a little and my sternum pulls itself out of my spine and settles back into place. If I have a Nike imprint on my chest the night that I can finally rock Erica's world ... I'll break the fucker's other leg and shove that one down his throat.

We get back to work.

This time ... he kicks her in the mouth and she stumbles to the floor in shock.

Words cannot begin to describe how much I enjoy fastening him down with restraints and slowly, emphasis on the slow, manipulate his leg. It will heal beautifully. He won't need surgery, but by the time I'm finished, I think he would beg to be put under. Lexie, who has a bruise on her chin, asks if she can put the finishing touches on the cast and I smile when she passes over the more masculine wrapping colors and goes for pink. He's flat on his back, staring at the ceiling, so he doesn't see that he's being wrapped up like Strawberry Shortcake. We exchange an amused glance when he finally sees it and groans. I help her finish up and she says, "Are you okay?"

I rub my chest as I pull the curtain on our Pink Princess shut. "I can breathe again."

"This is a job hazard for ortho, huh? I helped Dr. Simmons a few days ago and he got punched in the nose."

"Find out who the patient was so I can send them flowers."

She laughs, then looks at me closely. "Uhm, Dr. Torres-"

"You can call me Callie, Lexie."

"Oh. Right. Thanks." She glances around us like she's about to tell some fantastic secret that only I can hear. "I don't like Izzie Stevens either."

"No?"

"No. She's ... weird ... about George. About me and George. Which, there's nothing with me and George to be weird about, but that's not the point. She keeps inviting herself to our apartment and then she points out why his old room at Meredith's is so much better and she makes fun of everything I try to do to make it ... homey. And well, just between you and me, I can possibly admit that my attempts are a little pathetic, but she doesn't have to point that out." Grey seems to realize that she's talking to me like we're long lost friends and stops herself. "I'm sorry. I ... babble."

I don't know why, but the thought of her trying to make someplace 'homey' for my ex-husband makes me feel really, really happy. For both of them. "Let me give you a little piece of advice." She nods at me. "I once followed Stevens into an elevator and asked her to give me my husband back. I pleaded with her. I came as close to letting her see me cry as I could let myself and I stopped just short of dropping down on my knees to beg a little harder. What I should have done ... was follow her into that elevator and kick her ass so hard that she would have begged me to stop. She has a bad attitude and I should have adjusted it."

"Are - are you advising me to, uhm, kick her ass? In the elevator?"

I smile at her. She's actually kinda cute. I could see George being with her. "No. I'm advising you not to beg. I'm telling you not to ask her for anything. Tell her that when she's in your house ... she needs to respect you and keep her mouth shut. Don't expect George to do it for you. His blinders are so thick when it comes to her that he may have permanent damage. Just ... take up for yourself. Don't wait for anyone else to because when they let you down ... that hurts worse than anything that could happen when you do stand up for yourself." I point at the bruise on her face. "And put some ice on that."

"Thanks." Lexie smiles at me and it's genuine, almost sadly grateful. I wonder if all the Grey women are dark, twisted, and broken. "And, Dr. Tor - Callie, watch your back. She was at my place ranting about you last night because of what you said during her surgery with Dr. Hahn and ... she may try to kick your ass."

"That's all she would do. Try." I pat her on the arm and the movement causes my chest to ache from that well placed sneaker slamming against it. "Thanks for your help in there."

"Think you need an X-ray?"

"No. I think I need a break. I'm gonna go eat lunch. If you don't mind ... can you get the Whiney Ass Dickhead's discharge papers together for me? I'll sign them when I make him wait an hour."

Lexie happily agrees and I watch her head into the supply closet for an icepack.

I go into the bathroom to see if I need one between my tits and draw up short.

Stevens is at the mirror, blotting at her red face with paper towels.

It's nice to know that I'm not the only person who cries ugly. Her lips are peeled back and and my eyes are drawn to her crooked tooth, which is the only crack in her perfect, photographable, and flawless face. She meets my eyes and says, "I hope you're happy."

"I'm very happy," I tell her. "You?"

She turns away from the mirror, leaning back against the sink. "I told George that you were a weird freak when he met you and you proved me right."

"Really? I told George that you were a psychotic bitch not long after I met you and then you went and killed Denny and proved me right, too."

"Don't you ever say Denny's name again," she snaps. "Ever! You don't know what love is!"

"And you do?"

"Yeah. I do," she replies. "I know exactly what love is."

"You do fall in and out of it frequently. Was the ink even dry on Denny's death certificate when you hopped into bed with my husband?"

"At least I hopped into bed with a man."

"He hopped out pretty fast, didn't he?"

"Talk about moving fast ... you met and married George on fast forward."

"You met and got engaged to Denny a lot faster."

That makes her falter. When she finally speaks again, she says, "It doesn't matter. I won."

I cock my head to one side, looking her up and down. "George may have left me for you, but he didn't stay. You didn't win. I may be a weird freak, but I'm at peace with that. You? You're still the bitchy best friend who can't stand that George has a new buddy. That's not my definition of winning. That's being stuck on second base for the rest of your life while the rest of us play the game."

"Fuck you."

"No, thanks. I like my women to play with a full deck."

She takes a step toward me.

Oh, God, let her swing at me. Let her get one good lick in so that I can whip her ass like there is no tomorrow.

The door opens and I hear the squeak of shoes on the floor. Cristina's curls bounce up and down as she moves between us like she, all five feet two of her, could somehow stop something that has been months in the making. Okay, maybe she's not five feet two, but the fight that I've envisioned in my head between me and Stevens has never been closer to happening and I intend to finish it off with her head in the toilet. I know what that did to me in school. I should pay it forward.

"Bailey's looking for you," Cristina says to Izzie. "Something about waiting for lab work."

"Shit," Izzie says, smoothing a hand over her ponytail. I hope she didn't have a false sense of security since he hair was in a ponytail. I wasn't going to get near her hair to mangle her face.

When she walks around me ... Cristina moves as one with her, keeping herself between us.

Izzie leaves without looking back and I say, "What are you doing?"

Cristina turns and looks up at me. "Hahn is looking for you. If I announce that I found you and you're mangled ... she won't be as happy as if I point you out and you're not splattered in blood."

"It would have been Steven's blood. Not mine."

"It's still alarming."

"Why is Erica looking for me?"

"You're late for lunch. She actually let me do a running whip stitch earlier with the stipulation that I hurried the hell up so she wasn't late for your 'date'."

"Oooh, shit. I didn't know we had a lunch date."

"I think it's a standing one as far as she's concerned. Whatever you're doing ... keep doing it. I'm benefitting from it."

"Don't worry. I plan to. Thanks, Cristina."

"Also ... don't do anything else on hospital property to make Webber's head explode. I won't benefit from that. None of us will."

"I'll be good."

Yellow is pretty mad that I didn't meet her for lunch.

She becomes extremely pissed when I tell her that the reason is because I was hoping that Steven's would get within striking range. Reminding me of her earlier advice, Erica tells me that I let people affect me too much and then stalks off. She's heading into surgery so I can't follow her. Cristina whacks me on the arm to show me where her loyalty is and does the following herself. I go into the gallery again to watch and this time I keep mouth shut and watch Erica teach, working through the operation and asking Cristina several questions which she answers without hesitation. When my pager is still silent at one thirty, I go and tell Bailey that I don't feel well and ask to leave. She asks me if it has something to do with the kick heard round the world and I tell her that it didn't help. She insists on doing a quick exam and pressing against the most sore areas like her fingers are divining rods that know exactly where Whiny Assed Dickhead planted his foot. I'm fine, but she still lets me leave early. I take the keys to Erica's car from her purse and decide that I need to grovel a little better than I have been.

I need to make things special for her since she's always doing something for me.

She will be getting off at six and that gives me four hours to fly by the seat of my pants and pull romance out of thin air.

Ask me what I know about romance.

I drive all over town and find something so spectacularly perfect that it's going to say everything that a simple 'I'm sorry for the bumpy road we took to get here, but I'm so glad you're in it with me' can't.

After I give my credit card a workout and take everything back to the house, it's time to pick her up.

She's waiting in front of the hospital with her hands on her hips, but she slides into the passenger seat and puts her seatbelt on with a small grin. "I could have you arrested for stealing my car, Torres."

"You could," I agree, leaning over the console. "Or you could give me a kiss. I've had a bad day."

"I heard. How's your chest?"

"Affected by you ... like always. Inside and out."

"You're forgiven." She gives me a kiss, smiling. "Where have you been?"

"I got you a surprise," I simply say. "And the hot tub ... it's fired up and working just fine."

We make small talk on the drive to our place. I can't believe that I can think of it as my place too, but I do. I'm beginning to think that anywhere she is ... that's where home is, too.

The crap that I threw into the crock pot smells pretty decent (and I called my mother from the grocery store to ask what to buy), but I doubt it'll hold a candle to what Erica can do in the kitchen. I don't let her go there, however. I take her hand and lead her down the hallway to our bedroom, pausing outside the door. "Just so you know, Yellow, I pay attention to every single thing you say to me. And I want to give you everything you want."

Before she can reply, I open the door.

The black hairless cat on the foot of the bed sits up and looks at us, tilting his head to one side as he tries to decide if we're worth interrupting his nap. His big ears perk and he stretches, arching his back as he stands up, hops off the bed, and pads toward us. "That's Feo," I tell her. "That's Spanish for -"

"Ugly. Spanish for ugly," she replies, bending down to scoop the cat up. I watch her fingers dance over his velvety skin as she lifts him to eye level and and shakes her head. "The name certainly fits. It's the ugliest thing I've ever seen."

But then he stretches forward and rubs his nose against hers and I know that he has her. Right where he wants her.

She gasps when something rubs against her leg and looks down. I scoop up the beige colored cat that has decided to use her pants as a scratching post. Also hairless, also incredibly ugly to a fault, I lift the blue eyed cretin and cradle it in my arms. "This is Ruma. That's Finnish for ugly and they came as a set. Despite the fact that you and I and very attractive, Erica, when you look at them ... they're a little like us. This one," I hold up the beige cat, "has your eyes and coloring. That one has mine, though my teeth look a lot better than his. And they don't want to be apart ... even for a second."

"Ruma and Feo." She touches the cat in my arms on the nose and laughs when it bats at her hand. "I distinctly recall telling you that I wanted a cat ... not two cats."

"Fine," I reply with a smile. "That one's yours and this one is mine."

"Ours," she corrects, lifting her hand from the cat to my face. "We're a family now."

"Did you just get that memo?" I lean forward and kiss her. "Because I've known about that for a while."

"As much as I'd love to bond with our new ... ugly and tragically flawed pets ... I'd much rather bond with you in the hot tub."

We leave the cats racing around their cat tree that I paid entirely too much for and by the time we get to the back door, we're both naked. We race each other to the hot tub and she proceeds to kiss every inch of the bruise on my chest when she sees it reflected in the lights from the tub. I don't let her take the lead, though. It's my turn.

When all is said and done ... I'm sure that Louise O'Malley heard us three houses away. I bet Ronnie and Jerry are high fiving on their back deck and trying to give each other a play by play of what we're doing.

Trust me ... even they aren't imaginative enough to do it justice.

I'm pretty sure I've groveled enough.

And if there is a storm cloud on my horizon ... I'm not too concerned.

It's always easier to find shelter when you've got a place to call home.


	15. Chapter 15

"I think Jasper would benefit from the Fellman-Caputo."

That's how Derek cuts to the chase a week later. And what a week it has been. I feel like I've been living with Erica my entire life and I don't know how I lived before now. I fall asleep in the cocoon of her arms every night and wake up the same way. It's funny ... when I was living with Mark, I didn't like to sleep facing him. Hot breath on my face all night and his stubble rubbing against my skin was uncomfortable. With Erica, more often than not ... I'm face to face with her, watching her, when I finally drift off. Our legs have a tendency to tangle and I've woken up a few times with her fingers threaded through mine. That's my favorite thing ... knowing that she reaches for my hand even when she's asleep may be the most beautiful feeling in the world.

We're comfortable together and just a few days into the latest leg of our journey has found us establishing routines. She likes to cook and I don't feel the need to ask if my crock pot disaster where I turned chicken into leather impacted that or if she truly enjoys it, but I am not complaining. I cover laundry and cat food while she makes dinner and then we clean together, stumbling over Feo and Ruma who enjoy watching us clean the kitchen. It's probably because we amuse them by tripping over them repeatedly and swearing profusely. Feo may wind up thinking his name is 'damn cat' while Ruma constantly hears, 'move it, puss'. Feo is also as fascinated by Erica's hair as Jazz is because he will lie in wait, usually on the armoire, and snag his paw into her hair the second he gets the chance. This is particularly amusing if Erica is half asleep and stumbling toward the bathroom. She screams every single time.

I learn something new about my body every single day with her ... I never knew that making out on a sofa could be so ... flexible. Or that she would enjoy me taking full advantage of her dining room table for extracurricular activities. Twice. She was right ... there are things I can eat that rock her world. And mine.

When I told my mother that I was living with Erica, her voice trembled over the congratulations. She hid it well enough by telling me that the landscapers had used some kind of potting soil that she is allergic to, but I know my mother. My new beginning has opened a door for me, but it has shut another one for her. She won't be introducing my husband to her friends or buying 'son in law' cards like the one she sent George on a whim before I told her we had separated. It's sad that my happiness can affect anyone else's negatively. But it does. I can tell. As hard as she tries to accept it, Mom has to pin her dreams on Joel and Hope because Jasper and I aren't going to be winning any prizes in normalcy ... unless ...

I take a sip of my soda and look at Derek carefully before I speak. He is sitting across from me and he didn't bother with greetings or formalities. He simply said that Jazz could benefit from the procedure. "How much could it help him?" I ask.

Derek hands me two of the papers from Jasper's record. "This is your brother's hippocampus when he was ten. This is his hippocampus four years ago."

In the side by side comparison I can see that there have been changes ... for the better. The body is a miraculous thing. It will try to mend itself even when medicine says that there's no hope. It took months and months of rehabilitation to teach Jazz to speak, walk, eat, and use the bathroom again. Doctors didn't give my parents much hope that any of those things would be possible and viewing the initial scan makes me see why. The damage was significant and it's still significant now, but the brain rebounded from traumatic injury and rallied in many ways. Just not enough. Not nearly enough.

"This is the perfect area for a patient to have damage in order to qualify for the technique. Speech, motor functions, memory ... all of that can be stimulated enough to trick the brain into thinking. Literally." Derek says, pointing out a couple of areas like I'm not a doctor, too. It could offend me and probably would if I didn't know about his thoroughness. He's not talking down to me ... he's talking to me in the same careful manner that he talks to anyone who is considering surgery. "I think that he's young and healthy enough to meet the criteria he needs in order for us to move forward. Having said that," he hands me a manila envelope stuffed with neat papers, "I've got the real numbers to the Fellman-Caputo morbidity and mortality as well as the best and worst case scenarios. I also have all the paperwork completed on my end if you want to move forward. I need to know within two weeks."

I put the envelope in my lap. It's heavy and it should be. It's stuffed with lost souls who braved the knife ahead of Jasper and died in the name of medicine so that something could be learned at their expense. I wonder how many of them actually understood what was happening to them and that they could die. I wonder how many would have said no if they could have made that decision for themselves. I wonder if someone without a medical degree could understand the risk at all. "Thank you," I tell him. "I'll let you know something as soon as possible."

He nods and gets to his feet, then looks back at me. "Have you ... heard from Addison? Or Mark?"

"A friend of hers died in California so they went there for the funeral."

"A week long funeral? Must be a hell of a friend."

I don't mention that Addison and Mark have driven out to death valley to stay in a cabin so that they can work through their issues. Hmm, now that I think about it ... they could have driven to death valley so that no one could hear the screams when they killed each other. I did get a very angry voice mail from Mark and I could hear Addy in the background demanding her phone back. It wasn't pretty. People who argue as passionately as those two probably have great sex (it's true about me and Erica). My ears have been ringing a lot so I'm sure that I'm a major topic of their conversation, though I don't want to be. I don't wish that I could erase the time that I shared with Mark in his apartment because it was fun and playful and eye opening for me, but if I thought that erasing me from his past could help him heal ... I'd trade the memories in. I never lied about loving him ... I just didn't love him in the way he wanted. I want him to have love, though. Real love. And I want Addison to be on the receiving end of what he has to offer because it's good stuff. He's a good man and I wish that I could call him up and tell him so. I wish that I could fix our friendship.

I purposely avoid going over the information that Derek has given me until that night. While Erica is cooking some vegetable lasagna thing that she swears I won't hate, I spread everything out on the coffee table and start my internal pro and con list. I've made that list several times now, but faced with the facts in black and white ... my con lists starts to become much longer than it previously was. The reason I can't abandon the surgery completely, though, is that ten year old Jasper, before the accident, made me promise him that I'd never leave him. I had been at school for two years and the summers that I spent at home found us inseparable. We lived in the ocean, at the arcade, and I could spend hours watching him skateboard ... something I couldn't do. And still can't. I can't even look at a skateboard and not see him on it. When I packed my things to return to college he helped me and started to cry. I would be catching my flight in two days and we didn't know it then ... but the boating accident was less than twenty four hours away. I would miss my flight and go to school on crutches eight weeks late. Jasper would miss out on so much more.

I can remember our conversation as I realized that he was crying.

I sat down on the bed next to him and he said, "You'll always come back, right?"

"Yep. Always," I assured him. "You're my buddy."

"You're my buddy, too," he replied. "My best buddy. You won't ever leave me forever will you? You'll always remember me?"

"When I become a doctor ... I'll come and get you and we can live in a big house with video games in every room and we'll eat Pop Tarts for dinner and cake for breakfast." I kissed his head. He smelled like the ocean and little boy sweat from racing the wind with me all day. "I promise."

"I hate it when you leave me behind." He put his small hand in mine and I saw that his knuckles were scratched and his thumb had a scar. It made me sad to not know how he got it. "Callie, I wanna be just like you when I grow up."

"You're way cooler than me." I tickled him to make him stop crying.

I left him behind while he was still in the hospital hooked up to tubes and wires. I couldn't look at him. I went into his room once and fainted.

I told myself he died in the water and didn't know that I had stopped coming back for him.

It was a lie I believed for two years ... until he said my name on the phone and I realized that he hadn't died at all.

I had died.

I had broken my promise.

And I can make up for that now.

I'm pulled from floating around in a pity pool by Erica sitting down beside me and holding out a glass of lemonade. I reach for it, but my hand is shaking enough for her to set it on the table instead. She covers my hand with hers and I lean my head against her shoulder, sighing. We lean back against the plush cushions and her presence eventually chases away the boulders that are rolling around in my head. They stay gone for all of two minutes, however, because she says, "I had hoped that you were giving this up."

"Giving what up?"

"Don't play dumb." She gestures at the table, at the papers that outline everything so clearly that it's impossible to view it as a blessing or a curse. "Jasper is just fine the way he is so stop making yourself crazy and come eat dinner."

Way to poke the caged animal. "Jasper is not fine."

"He is more fine than you give him credit for. He's happy. I mean ... do you know how many people would trade places with him and not have to worry about bills or work or -"

I sit up and glare at her. "Bills and work? Is that really the best that you can reduce life to? What about being able to think and not have to rely on anyone else for basic things like making a sandwich or brushing your own teeth? What about being able to drive yourself where you want to go and living instead of existing?"

"What about being six feet under in a satin lined box and not existing at all? Because that's what could happen and I'm pretty fond of your brother."

"You say that like I'm not! You say that like you've been around him more than a handful of times and you haven't!" I should go find a shovel and start digging now because my temper is coming ... it's coming fast. "You don't really know him, Erica."

"I don't have to see him every day to know that the world would lose someone amazing if he dies on Shepherd's table!"

"YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT IT'S LIKE TO HAVE SOMEONE WHOLE AND THEN ONLY HAVE A PIECE OF THEM!"

"DON'T I!? WALK DOWN THE HALL AND TAKE A LOOK AT THE PICTURES! RACHEL WAS FINE ONE DAY AND NOT FINE THE NEXT!"

"LEUKEMIA IS NOT BRAIN DAMAGE!"

"IT TOOK HER FROM ME A PIECE AT A TIME, CALLIE! AND I'D STILL RATHER HAVE HER SICK AS HELL THAN NOT AT ALL!"

That couldn't hurt worse if she had hit me. The rational part of my mind tells me that she's just making a point. The irrational part hears one thing and one thing only. "You'd rather have her."

"Oh ... oh ... no, I didn't -"

"Don't."

If you've ever been in a car accident ... you know that you're happily driving along, possibly singing with the radio ... and it happens so fast that you have to sit there and take stock of yourself to see how badly you're damaged. That's why I do right. I look down at my chest to see if she left a hole when she ripped my heart out. I look down to see if I'm bleeding or if my shock electrified the wound enough to cauterize it. When you're in a car accident, instinct eventually kicks in and you know what to do ... if you're able. When my instinct kicks in ... I reach for my purse and shove my feet into my shoes. I'm going somewhere ... I just don't know where yet.

"Callie, please." She puts her hand on my arm, then reaches down and gently, but firmly pulls my purse from my grasp. "You know I didn't mean it that way."

Reason number 494839248 that I didn't want to rush to move in with her ... when I get pissed I can't go back to Cristina's.

What I can do is go outside and try to shake off the feeling that a ghost just ran through me. I stalk to the end of the yard and pace back and forth before I finally go into the gazebo and sit down. I'm not technically thinking about Jasper or his surgery now. I'm thinking about the photos in the hall that I glance at out of the corner of my eye before I look into the mirror to make sure I'm measuring up. It's an impossibly high standard. Rachel was to Erica what Erica is to me. She taught her how to be honest with herself and listen to what her heart was telling her and they had an epic love story that was years in the making. I've already hurt Erica more by living than Rachel possibly did by dying so of COURSE Erica would RATHER still have her here.

Hell, I need to go to bed and shut my mind down.

"You want to know what I think?" Erica asks, climbing the two steps of the gazebo and sitting down next to me. I don't answer and she doesn't wait for one. "I think that you would much rather be pissed at me than admit that I'm right this time. I think ... that you're intentionally trying to fight with me so you can stop fighting with yourself about whether or not this surgery is worth it. It's not, by the way."

"That's your opinion."

"My opinion doesn't count?"

"Not this time."

"Your opinion always matters to me, Callie."

"If I told you that I'd still give anything to be married to George ... what would you say? What would your opinion be then?"

"I'd say I'm sorry. I wouldn't wish that little shit on anyone."

"Right." I look at her, but I can't keep looking. Looking leads to kissing and kissing leads to me forgetting what she said. "I'm tired. I'm gonna go to bed."

"Dinner's ready. It smells good. I think you'll like it and -"

"I'm not hungry."

She sighs. "Can you please not be like this?"

"No."

"I can apologize for saying what I did until I'm blue in the face, Cal, but I'm not sorry that I loved her."

"I know."

"I'm also not sorry that after she died ... I was able to love someone just as much. It would be a pretty sad life for me if my heart had been buried with her. I'm much happier that you have it. And you do. All the way."

She moves a little closer to me and I stand up, gazing out over the trees. It's quiet. Peaceful. We can see the city, but we can't hear it. It's like looking at a still photo of Seattle in the middle of the woods. Crickets chirp, katydids sings, and tree frogs call back and forth to one another in a symphony of sound that I like just as much as listening to the waves crash against the beach in Miami. On the rare occasion that I opened a window at Cristina's place ... we heard engines, horns, and the metallic bass of street sweepers clanging against things. Listening to the smooth styling's of the animal kingdom lets me possibly admit that Erica could be twenty percent correct about Jazz's surgery. No ... ten.

She could possibly be fifty percent right about why I'd rather be pissed and argue with her than myself. Maybe ... sixty.

Fuck ... life was so much easier when no one existed who knows me better than I know myself.

I'm beginning to see that everything I thought I knew about relationships has been wrong all along. When I would get pissed at George for something ... he'd usually leave and let me cool off. Or ignore me. Or fuck his best friend. With Mark, he would rise to the challenge and fire back at me with both barrels until we were either too exhausted or too bored with the fight to keep going. Erica's different, though. She's great at reasoning and meeting me halfway and extending the olive branch. She's also excellent at makeup sex, groveling, and apologizing. I don't doubt where I stand with her and if she's mad at me ... I know she still loves me. If I'm mad at her ... I know that I'll love her through the anger and make it to the other side with nothing about that love sacrificed in the least.

I'm about to apologize to her when something hits one of the poles on the gazebo. I spin and look at her. "What was that?"

She's frowning and when she gets to her feet to join me at the gazebo railing something flaps against the roof.

You know what is chirping right now? Not crickets. Not tree frogs. Not katydids.

Bats.

The sound that a bat makes is very distinct.

Incredibly distinct in that it's unmistakable.

I scream when one flies past my cheek and I envision a face full of fang and waking up as Bela Lugosi.

It's sheer terror mixed with panic and the threat of my bladder erupting ... also a very distinct sound.

I'm pretty sure that I sprout wings as I race for the house. I'm equally certain that I would have the power to part seas, walk on water, and heal the blind because my prayers are that loud and passionate. God doesn't just listen ... he possibly considers canonizing me for the sheer conviction and volume of my faith in that moment. I'm babbling something about Moses when I charge up the back stairs and when my hand is on the doorknob, I can hear Erica laughing at me. "Get in the house!" I yell. "Bats!"

I'm shaking so badly when she does come inside that a tranquilizer gun shot straight at my ass with enough medication to take down an elephant would probably not phase me. She's still laughing when she comes in and locks the back door. "You can paint pink lips on a fucking snake, but a bat freaks you out?"

"I may be a little afraid of birds," I confess. "All birds. Any birds. Parakeets, chickens, parrots, gulls, roosters ... they freak me out. They're for eating and ... feather pillows."

She puts a hand over her mouth to stifle her laughter.

"Do not laugh! It's crippling! My mother threatened electroshock therapy when I was thirteen because Jazz had a talking Big Bird thing that scared me so much I beat it to death with my Dad's golf club."

I don't see Feo approaching and when he rubs against my leg, I nearly jump out of my skin. I think I levitate for a full minute and Feo takes offense to this outward display of demonic possession and hisses at me. That sound is far more soothing than the flapping, chirping, and tittering of bats so I bend down and scoop him up. Erica watches me, still smiling, and says, "You do realize that you're a little weird right?" she asks.

"Unfortunately."

"Don't change." She walks to where I'm holding the cat and kisses me. "Life with you is not boring."

"Is that a good thing?"

"It's a very good thing."

Ruma arrives, obviously dejected that he is not also being held, and sinks his teeth into Erica's bare foot to get her attention. She gasps and grabs him before he can do it again. She holds the beige cat up, scowling as she addresses him. "Listen, buddy, the only reason Buddha lived to do that more than once is because he was semi-cute. You ain't got nothing going for you at all."

"Liar," I say, stroking Ruma's whip of a tail. Erica reaches up and takes my hand in hers, kissing the back of it. I start to shake again, but it has nothing to do with fear. It has everything to do with how much I love her and how much I fear losing even a second with her when I'm mad. "We survived our first sorta fight as a cohabitating couple, Yellow."

"Yes, we did."

"I guess maybe we should ... make it official or something ... that I'm not pissed anymore."

She glances down at the sphynx she's holding, rubbing his ear. One side of her mouth quirks as she fights to keep the relief off her face. "What did you have in mind?"

"You hurt my feelings really, really bad," I reply. Her big, blue eyes meet mine and she opens her mouth to speak, but I don't let her. "Making up isn't official until you keep very, very quiet about the fact that I'll be skipping vegetable lasagna in favor of a buttery grilled cheese and potato chips."

"Is that right?" She sets Ruma on the ground and Feo scrambles from my arms to join him. Hooking her thumbs into the belt loops on my jeans, she pulls me against her. "Baby, I'll even cook it for you if that means I'm forgiven."

"Deal." I hug her ... because that's how fast I can be okay with her.

I am okay with her.

I'm me.

I put the research about the Fellman-Caputo technique on the dresser and leave it there. Erica doesn't mention it again. Neither do I. By the time we go to sleep ... I'm not actively thinking about anything except the fact that my toes may never uncurl again. She must have read every single book available on how to make love to a woman because that's what she does. Even when we're downright kinky ... her heart is in it. Her heart is all over me. That may be why I get off so fast every time. She starts in my chest and works her way down. Actually ... she starts in my head and works her way down which is even better. I've had good sex before. Hell, I've had great sex that bordered on marathon and macabre at the same time, but this is a whole new realm for me. Her house rule about giving instead of receiving is something she takes very, very seriously because she wants me to come first. Repeatedly. When she finally does let me reciprocate ... my heart is in it. I hope that she can feel that as much as I do because I need her to know what I can't put into words. I need her to know without me attempting to say it that, while I technically could live without her, I wouldn't want to.

We wind up working together the next day. A construction worker ignored his clogged arteries, let it catch up to him, and fell off a scaffold. The fall wasn't far, but the fact that he landed in front of a bulldozer and got his hand mangled all to hell and back nearly cost him his life. I have to amputate his left arm below the elbow and I do my level best to salvage as much of his wedding band from the carnage as I possibly can. After the amputation is finished, I spend close to an hour digging out pieces of gold and depositing the shards into a plastic container. Maybe he can have it melted and wear it around his neck. I'm jaded as hell when it comes to marriage, but he told me before surgery that his twenty third anniversary is approaching and he 'sure did hate to lose' his ring. He wasn't concerned about his hand ... just his ring. I'd be the same way about the yellow diamond bracelet that Erica gave me. It didn't come with vows, but I don't need vows to know that we've got them between us. When she finishes the angioplasty ... she joins me where I'm working on the severed arm and helps me fish around for gold like we're playing Operation and we're on a search for the funny bone.

When your lover helps you dissect amputated limbs ... that's as good as it gets. That's the ink completely dried on everything you need to say.

I'm at the sink scrubbing out, joking with Erica about 'digging for gold', when there are shouts in the hallway. We exchange curious glances because drama at the hospital usually involves me in some form or fashion, but I'm definitely not at the root of this.

Yeah, I'm wrong.

Lexie Grey is standing toe to toe with Izzie Stevens just outside the scrub room. The contrast between the two of them is night and day. Lexie is a pretty girl, but she's plain in comparison ... with her newly bobbed brown hair hanging limp around her flushed cheeks. Stevens' hair is long and flowing, shampoo commercial ready and even though her anger is apparent ... God apparently decided that making her pretty wasn't enough. She's not scarlet or ugly ... even when a hateful sneer creases her features and she says, "George invited me to come last night."

"Oh, wake up!" Lexie snaps, her hands on her narrow hips. Even though she's three inches shorter than Stevens ... her confidence and conviction make Izzie seem much smaller in comparison. I'm damn impressed. "He did not invite you! I specifically heard him tell you that we had plans and he would see you later!"

"It's not like drinks at Joe's is a date, you desperate idiot!" Izzie growls. "Just so you know ... you're not his type."

"You're not his type, you knock kneed freak!" Lexie cries. "And just so you know ... when you went to the bathroom ... George told me that you're bad in bed! He said that you do things with your gangly legs that should never, ever be done and it was like having sex with Gumby."

I can't help it.

That makes me laugh.

The previous night ... Erica told me that a certain thing I do with my legs could make her faint.

Izzie whirls around and looks at me. I try not to be obvious about the fact that I'm enjoying Lexie's throat cutting abilities, but it's a tough sell. Stevens narrows her eyes into slits and says, "Why are you laughing? Did you pass a mirror just now?"

"Oooh," I reply, pretending to be scandalized. "Is that the best you got, killer?"

Now there's something ugly on her face. "DO NOT CALL ME KILLER!"

"Why not? Truth hurt?" I ask sweetly. "Killer."

"That's enough," Erica says and I feel her hand on the small of my back, propelling me to walk.

Naturally, I would much rather hang around and see if Lexie is going to spill any other truths, but I comply and take a few steps forward. I pat Lexie on the shoulder as I start past her and obviously that is the match it takes to blaze Izzie's temper into an inferno. Two things happen at once ... I see a flash of her blond hair out of the corner of my eye and I realize that the braid under my scrub cap lets her dig her fingernails under the rope of hair and pull ... hard. Stevens doesn't pull me off my feet, but she does nearly scalp me, causing me to feel like there's a flamethrower pointed at the back of my head. Classic. It's absolutely classic that the bitch would attack me from behind. It's also absolutely wonderful that my Dad invested big bucks in teaching me how to handle this very thing. I sink my elbow into her stomach to get her off me and am rewarded by the 'oooomph' of air leaving her. Her breath smells like coffee and cigarettes and I briefly wonder when she took up smoking.

She comes charging at me, still doubled at the waist, and I simply lift my knee so that her face plants against it. The key to winning a fight is to stay calm. The second you get all invested and pissy and shit ... that's when you're going to lose. That's when you're going to overreact instead of just simply react. For the record, Meredith Grey would have kicked my ass in the locker room that day because I was too emotional.

I really, really want Izzie to hit me one good time though ... so she can at least say she tried. I'll even let her get one lick in before ...

Shit ... there it is. She hooks me in the jaw, rattling my teeth and I throw calm out the window. I hit her with everything I have in me to hit someone with and when my fist connects with her mouth, that perfect, pouty, pathetic mouth that ran for months at my expense ... I feel like a million bucks. I'm vaguely aware that her crooked tooth has split my knuckle and even less aware that people are now yelling ... because all I can concentrate on ... is 'The Eye of the Tiger' which is playing in my head as this little fight montage flickers on the big screen of my mind. I'm channeling Rocky and I'm going to win.

Much to my absolute dismay, Karev is suddenly there pushing Izzie against the wall and Erica, who is way stronger than I ever realized, pins me back against the other. I hear Izzie yelling something about kicking my fat ass and I push against Erica to get at the bitch because I'm nowhere close to finished. Only ... I am. Erica grabs my face with one hand and holds tight, forcing me to look at her. "Stop. Now."

Alex takes Izzie into the stairwell and when her voice dies out and stops stroking my rage, I stop struggling to get at her. There's an on call room around the corner and I find myself being yanked into it. Erica slams the door behind us and takes my hand in hers, examining the small puncture wound from Stevens' fang. Next, she looks at my jaw and then she says, "Are you trying to get yourself fired!?"

"She started it!"

"Oh that's the perfect response, Cal! Are you four?" She rifles through a nearby cupboard until she finds a box of tissue, which she presses against my hand. "You have got to stop letting her get a rise out of you. That's what she wants and you give it to her every single damn time you get the chance."

There's a knock at the door and Erica pulls it open. Cristina doesn't wait for an invitation. She carries in a small first aid kit and pulls the tissue off my hand, looking up at me when she sees it. "Webber asked me what happened to Izzie," she says, blotting up the blood on my hand and tearing open an alcohol swab, which she presses against the cut for maximum stinging capacity. "Lexie and I told him that she got hit in the face by the stairwell door and Alex was taking her to the clinic."

"Is that the best you could come up with?" I ask, cringing when she opens a suturing kit. I don't even think I need stitches, but Yang would stitch a vagina closed for the practice. Possibly her own.

"I can do that," Erica says, reaching for the needle.

"Yeah, but I've got it," replies Cristina, not looking at her.

"So, what did Webber say," I prod, hoping to avoid an argument over who gets to poke me like a pincushion. "Did he believe you?"

"He didn't say anything. Camille was admitted for pain management. If she makes it through the night ... it'll be a miracle." She doesn't look up as she places one solitary stitch on my knuckle and expertly knots it. "I think he would believe in the tooth fairy if he thought it would help right now."

"Who's Camille?" Erica asks, her eyes on Cristina's hands. I have a strong suspicion that she's seeing just how skilled they are right now, how they move with the artistry and precision of someone much further into the surgical program.

I nudge Cristina with my foot so that she can be the one to answer. She clears her throat and says, "Chief Webber's niece. She has terminal ovarian cancer. It went into remission once, but came back."

"Damn," Erica says, crossing her arms over her chest. "How old is she?"

"She'll be twenty in two days. I fucking hate cancer," Cristina replies, securing a bandage over my knuckle. She breaks the spine in an instant ice pack and holds it out, pointing at my jaw. "And, Callie, this is the last time I'm covering for you. If you're going to let someone like Stevens get to you then you deserve your pink slip. And you know it."

Erica's looking at her like she just realizes that she exists. "Nicely said, Yang."

"Thank you, Dr. Hahn." With a nod, Cristina walks out of the room and I watch Erica stare at the door for a few seconds.

"Burke used her too, you know?" I say softly. "That Harper Avery he won? She performed the majority of the Humpty Dumpty that was mentioned in the article. Every scrub nurse in this place was talking about the way he handed the reins to her and let her work by herself. I can only imagine how it must feel to be summarily ignored by everyone when it comes to what you can do with a scalpel. She knows that she is good is at cardio, but no one wants to acknowledge that. No one that counts, I mean."

Erica cuts her eyes over at me. "You really are transparent."

"And you really are mean to her." I snap. "You preach at me about letting people get under my skin, but Burke is so far under yours that Cristina is too ... just by association alone. That's not really fair to her."

"She slept with Burke to get ahead!"

I shake my head at her. "She fell in love with him and for Cristina Yang to agree to marry someone and then try to go through with it with painted on eyebrows and no vows and no real desire to have that piece of paper ... that proves she meant it. You can't help who you love. You know that."

"How is this a conversation about Yang all of the sudden?" she demands. "And why did she have painted on eyebrows?"

"It's a long story for another time," I reply, getting to my feet. I slink toward her and flip the lock on the door. "Erica -"

"Absolutely not. I have very, very strict rules about on call rooms and you know it. I told you a long ago that I didn't plan on meeting you in any. And I'm not going to -" Her voice dies out as I pull my shirt over my head and toss it onto a nearby table. She's silent as I toe off my Crocs and slide my pants and underwear down. When I'm in nothing but my bra, I turn and say, "Can you unfasten this? My hand hurts."

"Your ass is about to hurt." She whacks me on the backside and kisses my neck as she opens the clasp. "You are a dirty, rotten person."

"I'm about to show you how right you are."

I definitely show her. I spend our lunch hour showing her and make her late for her next surgery, but she doesn't complain. What she does do is shoot me a dirty look when we step into the hallway together and find a sign taped to the door. It simply says "hot" and I wad it up, tossing it into the trash. It's better than what it could have said, I guess. We could have gotten labeled as something a lot colder than 'hot'. She winks at me and heads toward the scrub room and I stand there like a lovesick dog to watch her until she rounds the corner.

I set a dislocated shoulder, which is the highlight of my afternoon. It's that boring. I'm so glad when my shift ends that I can't wait to leave. I shower, change, and loiter outside the attending's locker room until she emerges. Her hair is curling around her face from her own shower and the smell of lilacs is overwhelming when she takes my hand in hers. "I just realized who else is getting a year older in two days."

"You just realized? My birthday is your locker combination," I tell her. "And I despise birthdays so we can pretend that it's not."

"I love birthdays," she replies, putting her arm around my waist.

I lean into her and inhale her fresh, clean scent as we head into the parking deck. As a rule, I don't love parking decks. If I were going to write a murder mystery it would be about a serial killer who lurks in parking decks because that's the perfect place to stalk someone without them knowing it. Especially the deck that we use. Instead of sinking money into a fancy security system ... the best that Seattle Grace can do is add a little lighting. I don't mind the lack of security, though, because I wouldn't want anyone to see the fact that I grope and kiss her senseless in the elevator the second the doors slide shut. I also would hate for anyone to see that she exposes my breast and sucks my nipple into her mouth all in a matter of seconds. When we finally arrive on the fourth level ... I'm tempted to let the seat down in my SUV and fog the windows up before anyone can figure out what we're doing inside. I tell her exactly what I want to do to her as we walk, my mouth against her ear.

"Oh my god," she says, drawing up short. Her hand on my stomach stops me and I look at her, then follow her line of vision.

"Oh my god," I echo, staring at my car.

My Range Rover has witnessed some truly impressive dings, scratches, and dents in its fourteen years of life. I've only had it four of those years and when I bought it ... I thought the beating that the previous owner had given it made it have character. Right now, any character it had has died a tragic death. The back glass is completely broken out and the word 'DYKE' takes up the back and front glass on the passenger side. I can see that the tire is flat and glass crunches under my shoe as I step closer. Someone took a key to the side of my car with enough ferocity to expose the metal and peel the red paint away so that it curls like a ribbon in spots and when I peer through the window, I can see that the front seat has suffered a thorough gutting. My radio is gone and a Bible has been left on the passenger seat, its leather cover spotted with debris as if this destruction is what God would have wanted.

I've been targeted for hate too many times to count. I was too rich, too ethnic, too fat, too clumsy, too weird ... to fit my square shoulders into a round world, but this is beyond that. This is beyond words or labels or ... reproach.

I don't care too much for material things, but I bought my 'Red Rover' myself, with the money from my salary. It was my first major purchase in life that I didn't have to dip into my family's funds or ask their opinion about. I saw it sitting in someone's yard and rang the bell. Writing the check had felt surprisingly liberating and when the radiator malfunctioned a few days later ... I felt a moment of separation anxiety when I left the Rover at the shop and climbed into a cab. Right now ... I feel like someone broke her to break me and it pretty much works.

I realize that I'm crying when Erica speaks behind me. She's on the phone with 911 and she's asking me if the car was locked. I nod at her and she falters when she sees the tears on my face. "Callie, come here. Don't touch anything, baby."

I comply, but I move in a daze, staring at the damage like I've never seen anything like it before. She pulls my head against her shoulder while she tells the dispatcher where we're located and gives them the physician's code to enter the restricted area. We walk toward the entrance ... or rather she leads me and I shamble along beside her, my head still against her. She hangs up the phone when we round the corner and it's a relief to know that I won't have to see my vehicle for a few minutes at least. Her phone goes back into her purse and she hugs me, rubbing my back. We could say a million things. I could ask why someone would do that and she could tell me that people are ignorant assholes, but we don't have to speak at all. She's hurting with me because we're in this thing together and she already knows and has answered everything I could ask at this point just by hanging onto me.

She has calmed me sufficiently when the police arrive and one of their first questions is if we're involved, like our joined hands don't give it away. I want to ask why that matters, but as the officer talks about 'hate speech' and 'vandalism' and 'hate crimes' ... I concede that he has every right to ask if the word is ... relevant. Dyke. A dike is a levee or a damn. It keeps water from overflowing. If I'm a Dyke ... I should be able to keep myself from overflowing, but I can't. I start crying again when several co-workers come out and stop to watch the officer snap photos. The wrecker is on the way and at Erica's insistence, they will be fingerprinting and going over my car with a fine tooth comb. I bet the Blue Book value on the Range Rover is less than five thousand bucks, but it's not the money. It's the fact that someone would dare do that to me. To us.

I wipe my tears away and glance to my left when someone holds out a handful of tissue. Derek gives me a sad smile and puts his arm around my shoulders, squeezing lightly. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I reply, while I shake my head no.

He stands with me while the officer puts on gloves and retrieves a few valuables, handing them to Erica.

He's still standing with us when the young policeman tells us that we should go home.

Derek volunteers to drive us and we invite him in when we get there, but he declines. Erica goes to unlock the front door and Derek puts his hand on mine. "Callie?"

"Yeah?"

"My sister took a girl to Prom and someone threw a brick through the window the next night. They had painted the word 'homo' on it with white paint. Mark just happened to be riding his bike at the time. He was about fifteen and he tried to kick the asses of the two guys who had done it. He played football with them and even though they were seniors and they graduated and left ... he dealt with being called 'gay' from everyone else who heard the story. I've thought a few times that the reason he goes through women like he does is because he felt like he had something to prove." He gives me that patented McDreamy smile. "Don't let this get to you. Don't let it change who you are."

"Did your sister change? After that?"

"No."

I give him a small grin. "It won't change me either."

"Good." He glances out the windshield, then back at me. "By the way, Mark and Addison are back. She dropped by the hospital while you were, er, napping in the on call room."

My face turns bright red and I nod. If he isn't Chief of Surgery one day ... he will truly have missed his calling. He's got the subtle thing that Webber does where you feel condemned without condemnation in spades. "I'll call her."

"Have you talked to your parents about the surgery for Jasper yet?"

"Not yet."

"You'll let me know?"

"Absolutely." I climb out of the car and smile in at him through the open window. "Thanks for the ride."

"Anytime. Have a good night."

As I head up the stairs toward the front door, it dawns on me that who you were in high school couldn't matter less. I always thought that Mark had the perfect high school experience with his movie star charm and megawatt smile. I guess that proves what I know.

Things aren't perfect for anyone ... no matter what you mistakenly think.

Erica isn't in the kitchen or the living room when I head inside. I stop to play with Feo and Ruma, who dart underneath my legs in attempted murder, then head upstairs to search for her. I can hear water running in the bathroom and I don't knock ... I simply go in. She's bending over the sink washing her face and I can tell that she's crying. I pick up the towel when she shuts the water off and blot her skin dry myself. She looks at me and I feel slightly uncomfortable because she searches my face like she never has before. Finally, she says, "I'm sorry."

I push her hair behind her ear. "Why are you sorry? Did you destroy my car?"

"Inadvertently, yes." Her eyes swim with fresh tears and it just about kills me. "It's because you're with me. It's because -"

"It's because people are jealous," I tell her. "That's all. They know we're happy and -"

"Did anyone ever destroy your property when you were with Mark? Did they ever write 'hetero' on your car?"

"No."

"Then it's because of me. And you're not used to this kind of thing, Callie. No one should have to be used to it. So if you want to go or -"

"Whoa." I drop the towel on the counter and put my hands on her hips. "Do you want me to go?"

"Never."

"It would take a lot more than someone trashing my car to make me leave you. Hell, it would take four acts of Congress and about fifty acts of God to make me budge." I hug her. "I needed a new car anyway. And I can just imagine how thrilled my Dad will be when I call him up and tell him he can buy me one for my birthday. He's been emailing me pictures of BMWs and Jaguars since he got back home. He did not like my Rover."

She leans back a little and rests her hand on my face. "You don't have to pretend that this isn't killing you. You don't cry easily and you fell apart."

"Obviously you don't know me like you think you do, Yellow, because I have cried so much just trying to be with you ... that it's second nature to do it by now. I once thought that I'd never have to take you back to the beach because I've cried enough to give you the ocean." I sigh when the tears she's fighting with win the battle and spill over her cheek. I kiss them away as much as I can. "You're the one who crawled my ass about letting people get to me so stop it."

"They're not getting to me," she replies softly. "You are. I just - I'm grateful to love you, Callie. I'm grateful that you love me, too."

"Nothing says 'grateful' like greasy pizza and chocolate chip cookies ... which I happen to know you bought the other day."

Laughing, she hugs me again. "Nothing says 'whipped' like the fact that I'm going to go cook those while you call the pizza place."

I hang onto her when she starts to step away. "Erica?"

"Hmm?"

"I love you, too. So much that I probably would have eaten that warmed up vegetable lasagna thing. Just sayin'."

"I love you too much to make you. It was pretty bad."

"You failed in the kitchen!?"

"But I rocked in the bedroom after that."

We rock in the bathroom for close to an hour before I pull myself together enough to order pizza.

I hope whoever demolished my car didn't think it would affect my sex life.

I call my Dad while we wait for the pizza. Leaving out many of the more shocking details, I ask his advice on which car he thinks would be the best. He takes the news that my car was vandalized in the same manner he would accept me telling him that I had won the lottery. He sounds like he won the lottery and if the actual crime had not been so hurtful in nature ... I would consider him the prime suspect. He rambles for twenty minutes about the merits of a Mercedes and then tells me all about how the Jaguar performed in safety. No part of me wants to drive a flashy, showy car into work and park it where Red Rover was murdered ... that's like begging for a serial killing ... so I mention the Infiniti FX, which is middle of the road. It's not a Honda, but it's also not a BMW and they have it in a gorgeous orange-y color that keeps catching my eye. He tells me that he'll look into the safety and performance and makes me promise I won't go to the Infiniti dealer and buy one immediately. I promise that I won't and then dive into the cookie batter when Erica goes to pay for the pizza.

I practically inhale a spoonful of goodness before she can return. When she walks back into the kitchen, I act like I didn't just ingest half of the batter. She glares at me, runs her thumb over my bottom lip, and shows me the melted chocolate. I come very close to dropping the phone when she licks it from her thumb. She doesn't just lick ... she strokes. My heart rolls around in my chest a few times.

"Can I speak to Erica?" Dad asks.

"Uh ... why?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

I glance at her and point at the phone, mouthing that my Dad wants to talk to her. She takes the phone with far more confidence than I feel and says, "Hey, Santos." There's a pause. "Yes. Yes, I'm great. How are you?"

This is a very stressful situation.

Very stressful.

I don't know what they're talking about, but Erica's laughter doesn't comfort me nearly as much as it should because I can't hear what they're saying and who knows what my Dad could say. Or God forbid ... if my mother gets on the phone. I reach for the cookie batter again because nothing is as calming as chocolate chips and raw eggs, but Erica pops my hand, pointing at the pizza box. When she holds up the wooden spoon to threaten me further ... I turn and point at my backside in clear invitation. She gets choked on her red wine and it's nice to know that I can affect her as much as she affects me.

She hands me the phone just as I open the pizza box and my Dad says goodnight.

"What was that about?" I ask, when I hang up the phone.

Plucking a slice of pizza from the box, she shrugs at me. "He wanted me to promise that I would stop you from buying any old junker. I told him I would."

Something horrific suddenly dawns on me as I take a bite of my own slice. "Erica Marie Hahn! If you are helping my father plan anything that involves my birthday I will not have sex with you until my next birthday rolls around. I mean it."

"Would I do that, Iphigenia?"

I narrow my eyes. "You actually just called me that. You would do anything."

"Probably."

"I don't like birthdays."

"Aww ... then you won't like the 'Birthday Love' kit that I bought you that comes complete with illustrated Kama Sutra cards and a feather tickler."

I stop chewing and swallow. "Birthdays are my most favorite day of the year."

"I'm not giving it to you early.

"Wanna bet?"

She does.

We burn the cookies and set off the fire alarm, but it's well worth it.

I thought that I would have trouble falling asleep, but I was wrong. After we soak in the bathtub and she cleans my hand again, I curl into her arms and close my eyes from exhaustion. We weren't defeated today. We weren't even slightly defeated. If anything ... we came out of it stronger. We're holding on in the middle of a No Man's Land. Literally.

If someone has a problem with that it's their problem.

I refuse to let it be mine.

"Cal?"

"Yeah?"

"Yang did a fine job stitching your hand."

"Yep."

"She cares about you."

"In her own taciturn, unaffected, and remote way ... she does."

"I'll try harder. To be nice to her. And to Addison."

I smile. "Good."

"You wanna meet a couple of my friends from Presbyterian."

She had friends at Presbyterian? I've been hanging out with her religiously for almost a year and she's just now mentioning friends at Presbyterian? "Uh ... sure."

"Tomorrow night?"

"All right."

Hmm.

People are surprising.


	16. Chapter 16

The news of my vandalized car has spread through Seattle Grace like wildfire. The cliques that exist have drawn their own conclusions and bend my ear about obvious suspects. The nurses are certain that the culprit is a religious orderly who had a bad day and decided that God would be nicer to him if he stoned Red Rover to death. The orderlies are convinced that the nurses still hold a grudge against me for the entire Mark thing. The residents think interns probably did it because they're still in 'college prank mode' and the interns are convinced that vile Dr. Simmons, who heads up Ortho and makes it a point to express his dislike of me daily, took his geriatric ass to the parking deck and turned his hate into art. Erica shot down my theory that Izzie, after I mangled her face, had every motive. Erica thinks that's too obvious and while Izzie is a skank, but she's not a stupid skank. Addison, who sits with us at lunch (albeit nervously), sides with me and scowls across the cafeteria at Stevens, who has her back to us.

"I can't believe I missed the fight. I've encouraged you to go all 'Matrix' on her ass and you do it when I'm not here!?" Addison sighs. "Callie, that's just wrong."

"It was wrong," Erica snaps, narrowing her eyes at her. "She could have gotten fired."

"Yeah, but I didn't," I say, putting my hand on hers. Erica said she would try with Addison and I don't think snarling and death glares is trying too hard. From the moment that Addy greeted me with a hug this morning and proceeded to exclaim over the bruise on my jaw and my bandaged hand, Erica has been less than thrilled with life. I get that she hasn't forgiven Addy for slapping my face, but she's also not extending anything that remotely resembles an olive branch. "So, yay."

"Whoever did it," Addison says, "knew that the parking deck would be empty for extended periods of times because of the shift change falling like it did."

"Well, that narrows it down to everybody who works here," I reply sarcastically. "Ugh, I don't want to talk about this anymore."

I shoot a pointed look at Addison, who she shakes her head firmly. "Well, we are not talking about me. Or Mark. At all. Let's talk about Jasper's surgery. I saw that Derek had the paperwork ready to apply for the trial."

My eyes widen. This is not a topic I want to get close to in Erica's vicinity. "Let's not talk about that either."

Addison pats my hand. "He'll be fine. Derek's good at what he does and Jazz stands to benefit from it so much. I mean, he needs it. He needs to know everything that life offers instead of what Lori Anne shows him. No offense to your Mom ... but the way she dresses him would mortify a twelve year old. He's a man."

I laugh. "Yeah, the plaid and the khaki will be the first thing to go. I will fully support him being the classic skater dude with the long hair, baggy shorts, and vulgar t-shirts."

Grinning, Addison nods, "Oooh, or he could decide to be all GQ."

"Or," Erica deadpans, her voice lower than it usually is. "He could be accepted like he is and not forced under the knife to change what people perceive to be 'wrong' with him. You can dress him up in skater clothes or make him look GQ the way he is now if what he looks like is so important. Or ... you could let him be and enjoy the fact that he's here and he's healthy."

Addison raises her eyebrows pointedly when Erica gets up and carries her tray toward the trashcans near the front of the room. I watch her go, expecting her to come back, but she doesn't. I sigh and say, "She doesn't think that Jazz should have the surgery. She thinks that it's too risky and that the threat of losing him is too high."

"Is she always against everything you do?" Addy asks. "Because in the thirty minutes that I've been talking to the two of you ... she's made it very clear that you need to not eat regular chips or drink Coke, that you shouldn't have hit Stevens after she attacked you, and that you're wrong about Jasper ... who, incidentally, is your brother. So, am I missing something or did she not get the memo about being supportive of your lover?"

"She is. Supportive. She's just ... on edge after what happened yesterday. It was stressful."

"I'm gonna be blunt." Leaning forward, she rests her elbows on the table and looks me dead in the eye. "I've yet to see anything in her that would explain to me why you would leave Mark ... the same Mark who pretty much worshipped the ground you walked on ... for her. I've seen her yell at Yang for nothing, argue with Richard over nothing, and now I see her disagreeing with you over something as simple as what you want to eat. So forgive me, but I don't get the appeal. She's harsh."

"You've obviously been listening to Mark."

"I've seen it. She's cruel to people, specifically Yang. And -"

"Erica and I discussed that last night and she said that she was going to give her a chance."

"She shouldn't have to give her a chance. She's the cardio attending and Yang wants cardio. That means Erica is contractually obligated to teach her because she signed on at a teaching hospital. She doesn't have to like her, but she agreed to do it."

"I'm not going to sit here and listen to you badmouth her. Addison, I love her and I'm happier than I have ever been."

"I'm glad that you're happy, Cal, because you deserve it ... but I'm not impressed."

"You don't have to be."

"Fair enough." Addy returns to her sandwich and takes a bite. "By the way ... I'm back at the Archfield."

That's a shock, but I try to keep the evidence of it off my face. "I thought your things were at -"

"Change of plans. I'm on the twenty fourth floor now, though. Way nicer view."

"Why are you there?"

"Because Mark and I decided that we need to get to know each other again. Who we are now, I mean. He's not the same Mark Sloan and I'm definitely a different Addison. I - I think maybe a few brain cells died from all the organic shit I ate in California." She plucks a chip from my tray and smiles at me. "But I can do the dating thing. I can also warm up to Erica if that's what I have to do because I really did kinda like her the first time I met her."

"So ... is Mark going to warm up to me again or has he pretty much written me off?"

"You're impossible to write off. As soon as he finishes licking his wounds ... he'll remember that."

"You planning to help lick those wounds?"

She stops chewing. "Pervert."

"I prefer sexually charged."

"Sexually enhanced," she corrects.

"Oh my God!" I gasp, leaning toward her. "Erica found the Purple Pulsater that you gave me as a wedding gift."

"Ah, the gift that keeps on giving." She snags another chip. "Did she use it on you?"

"I didn't hear that."

"Oh come on! Tell me!"

"No, Addison."

"No, she didn't or no you're not telling me." She purses his lips playfully and in a singsong voice adds, "Someone's turning red. She so used it and you so liked it."

"Stop talking."

"It's good to use it, Callie. You don't want to get cobwebs."

"STOP. TALKING."

Now she actually sings. "It was a one eyed, one horned, flying purple people eat-"

I throw a chip at her, but I have to laugh. Addison is that friend who isn't afraid to tell you what she thinks and can still make you laugh afterwards. She's that friend whose life you try on for a while and realize that it doesn't quite fit. She accepts it when you return it and doesn't mind that you've stretched it too much and have made it hard for her wear again.

I hope that she can get to know the real Erica ... because I think she'd love her, too.

And I hope that Mark can want to know me again ... because I think he'd realize that it's okay for me to love him as a friend.

I really just hope for a lot of things.

Like a good surgery ... which doesn't happen.

I purposely took extra care with my appearance so that I would look presentable when I meet Erica's friends. As horrible as it sounds ... I really didn't think that she had any which is absolutely ridiculous. You'd think she would have mentioned them, though. She has avoided my questions about them all day and when I find her two hours after lunch, she appears to be just as cranky as she was during lunch so I don't press. What I do is ask her if she wants to head to the roof and enjoy the view. For a split second ... she looks like she wants to decline, but she holds out her hand and we take the elevator up. It's windy and I didn't consider what that would do to the hair I spent an hour on, but I roll with it because she leans her face into the wind with a strange look that concerns me a hell of a lot more than my hair.

"Erica, are you okay?"

"I'm tired. I couldn't sleep last night. I kept thinking about your car and how - fuck - I really, really hate people."

"I know the feeling." I watch her closely. I've seen what she looks like when she's tired. This doesn't look tired to me. "You want to tell me what that was at lunch?"

"Addison doesn't like me." Erica pulls her white lab coat a little tighter and sighs, scuffing the toe of her shoe along the rough surface of the roof. "I can tell."

"Well, Yellow, you did threaten to flay her skin off and shove it up her ass if she hit me again." I wrinkle my nose. "It's hard to bounce back from that."

"In my defense, I was sleeping when she called me." She gives me a lopsided grin that does crazy things to my stomach. "And if she hits you again ... I'll show her that I can keep my word."

"That's oddly sexy. Not so much with the flaying or the shoving ... but the fact that you get all protective? I like that." The door opens behind us and Stevens comes out, lighting a cigarette and blowing a plume of smoke into the air. "She hit me, too. Maybe you should toss her off the roof."

"It's expected from her. Not from Addison." She tugs me into her arms and kisses me. I'm vaguely aware that the door opens again and slams behind us, signaling that Stevens finally realized that she wasn't alone on the roof. When we break apart, Erica rubs her nose against mine. "What do you want for your birthday?"

"I've already got it."

"Nothing else?"

"Nope."

"I can think of a few things that you would like."

"I'm sure you can." I hug her, wrapping my arms around her neck. "So, who are these friends of yours that we're meeting?"

She shakes her head. "You'll see."

"You're honestly not going to tell me anything about them?"

"Nope. But just so you know ... I value their opinion. So if they don't like you ... well, you're out of luck."

My smile fades and my mouth drops open in shock. "Oh my GOD! No pressure or anything!"

Our pagers sound at the same time.

I shouldn't have hoped for surgery.

Now I'm nervous as HELL about tonight and I have to force myself to have steady hands while I cut into an ankle and try to pin it back together.

I wish that Addison had not voiced her opinion about Erica ... because her words stay on my mind a little too much for my liking.

"Stop fidgeting, baby."

"I'm not," I reply, gazing out the windshield. I am definitely fidgeting. I can't get comfortable in the seat, my legs feel too long as I attempt to stretch them out, and the seatbelt is confining. Usually, Erica's car is very, very comfortable, but right now it's killing me. It's like riding in a bubble of claustrophobia.

"Just breathe," Erica says calmly, turning onto the highway.

Oh, if only it were that easy. I had a minor panic attack when I changed out of my scrubs and put the jeans and shirt I had chosen on. I couldn't exactly bring four or five outfits to work with me and Erica made it very clear that we were leaving from the hospital to meet her friends. She looks put together and perfect in a pair of cream colored pants and a short sleeved shirt with dark brown and beige swirls. I look frumpy in comparison and I wish I had worn the navy blue shirt I debated on instead of the red one because red screams 'easy' or something. I squirm against the leather seat of the car and crank the air up, letting it blast me in the face before my makeup melts off. It's a good thing I keep deodorant in my locker because I'm sweating like a pig. I have the distinct impression that my girlfriend is enjoying my discomfort a little too much because she cheerfully sings along with the radio as she navigates traffic and a) she's tone deaf and b) she's smiling and I know for a fact that she hates The Beatles.

I seldom visit the side of town that Seattle Presbyterian is on. It's considered the 'rough' area even though it's like a ghost town. There are abandoned buildings and closed down shops all over the place. Poverty settled thick into the area a long time ago and Presbyterian is the only safe harbor that a lot of locals have. Because of its proximity to the water ... they see a ton of fishermen and dock workers on a routine basis. The hospital isn't overly large, but it does boast one of the best trauma centers in the Northwest. I came very close to applying for a residency there at one point based on that alone, but Seattle Grace won out. Truthfully ... I wanted to put as much distance between me and Miami as I could. Miami is a ghost town for me, too. The ghosts of my past linger over everything there and I can only take it in small doses.

I'm a little shocked when she drives into the parking lot of the hospital. I kind of expected to meet her pals at a restaurant or at one of their houses, but she takes the parking pass from the machine and the arm swings up to let us park in the visitor area. She drives toward a building that is separate, but connected to the main structure by a long glass walkway, and parks near the double doors. There's a sign overhead that reads, 'Summer Smash' and several balloons have been attached to the metal stair rail. I realize that the building isn't a break room or a common room for the doctors when I see the wheelchair ramp and the large letters on the side.

Seattle Presbyterian Mental Health Professionals ... the words are gold against the stark whiteness of the building and I glance her way when she cuts the engine.

She simply smiles at me and opens her door. I follow suit and watch her retrieve an oversized bag of lollipops from the backseat. It's big enough to pacify an angry hoard of greedy Trick or Treaters. She doesn't offer her hand as we walk up the steps, but I don't say anything. She goes so far as to stuff her empty hand into her pocket and I get the message ... whether she means to drive it home so clearly or not. We're not together here.

I don't let it bother me too much because I have a very strong suspicion that Erica's friends ... are very much like Jasper.

My theory is proven correct when she walks into the 'Summer Smash' and becomes the center of attention like a celebrity returning to her high school. She's instantly surrounded by people who stumble over each other to be able to grasp some part of her. With an authoritative voice, she tells her fan club that she wants them to meet a friend of hers and then I'm enveloped in the swarm and thoroughly hugged, patted, and squeezed. Because of Jasper, I'm at ease with the slow speech and endless questions. I don't mind repeating my name and hearing variations of it murmured incorrectly in response. Erica knows every name, every face, and she tells me something specific about each of them as she introduces them one at a time. There are eleven patients in all and I can tell that Erica's comfortable, she's in her element, and she makes each person feel special. There are no children, just teenagers and adults who try to talk at once ... bending her ear about everything from their new shoes to the ruffles on their dresses.

With the patience of Job, she untangles herself and greets several staff members. They usher their charges toward a nearby row of tables while one man stays behind. He's extremely jovial and if his beard was white instead of bushy brown he would make a great Santa. He's got a big, round belly and twinkling eyes when he shakes my hand. "You must be Callie. Erica said you were pretty, but that's an understatement," he says, winking at me. "I'm Jim Phillips."

It would be ever so nice if I had a single clue who Jim Phillips was. "Hi, nice to meet you."

He gives me an oddly familiar, ultra tooth whitened smile and looks at Erica. "They were so excited to dance that Geneva funky chickened her way into the radio and smashed it. You wouldn't happen to have a boom box on you, huh?"

"Sorry," she replies, shaking her head. "I left it at home with the kitchen sink."

Jim makes a face at her. "Caleb isn't here tonight to play the piano so this is a music free fiesta. Unless you suddenly figured out how to play something more than 'Chopsticks'."

When she shakes her head, he swears under his breath. "I promised music. And singing."

I glance at the baby grand in the corner of the room. You don't grow with a music producer for a father without learning a thing or two. Music was as common in our house as breathing. I can remember sitting quietly on top of the piano in our study while Billy Joel, literally... Billy Freakin' Joel ... worked through the less than stellar moments of a song he wanted to release while my dad paced the room listening. Some truly amazing music emerged from that study and I was too used to it happening to soak it all in too much. The only time I was ever excited to see any celebrities in our house was New Kids on the Block and I came so close to fainting that my mother had to put ice cubes on the back of my neck. I was fourteen years old and went running into the study in my gown and fuzzy slippers because I thought Joel was lying about them being there. Donnie Wahblerg leaned down and picked my glasses up, slipped them back on my face, then kissed the tip of my nose like I hadn't just rolled out bed with my hair stuck up at all angles and the wire around my neck that connected to my braces was invisible. Yes ... he kissed me and I broke out in a cold sweat all over. I almost gave in to the urge to pretend to choke to death to see if he would give me mouth to mouth, but my mother took one look at my star struck, pasty face and ushered me to the kitchen where ice cubes did more than stop my swoon ... the cold chips made me realize that I had just humiliated myself beyond anyone's humiliation in life.

The band stayed for dinner.

I hid in my room under my New Kids on the Block comforter ... which truly ... only added insult to injury at that point.

There's a young girl standing in front of the piano now and I recognize her as the infamous funky chicken dancing Geneva. Her name stuck in my head when Erica introduced her and so did her beauty. Her ebony skin is radiant as she brushes her fingers over the keys of the baby grand like a whisper, not making them tinkle at all. "I, uh, could help you out with the piano," I say softly, still watching Geneva. "Years of practice could finally be put to good use."

"Now this is a team player!" Jim says, taking my arm. "Can you read sheet music?"

"I can write sheet music in my sleep."

Erica, who did not know that I could tickle anything ivory except her, watches with a shocked expression as he leads me to the piano and hands me a book of Disney music, telling me that anything and everything I want to play would be greatly appreciated. I sit down on the bench, then slide to one side a little as Geneva sits next to me. She doesn't make eye contact with me, but she flips the pages and points at 'Beauty and the Beast'. "One of my favorites," I tell her and she grins shyly. I play the first page, but before I can reach up to turn to the next, she does it for me, watching my fingers. "Can you play, Geneva?"

She shakes her head and waits for the song to end. She chooses 'When You Wish Upon A Star' next and I realize that she's humming along as I play. Her eyes close as she rocks her head back and forth a little. Two more patients walk up and lean against the piano, resting their palms against the side to feel the vibrations. One of them, a man with the beginnings of gray in his temples, sings along. He mangles the lyrics, but the gap toothed grin he gives me more than makes up for any real ability to carry a tune. When I finish the song, he claps his hands enthusiastically. If I remember correctly, his name is Brandon, and his Down Syndrome is evident in his features and spotted eyes. "Do Aladdin!" he cries, hopping in anticipation. "Aladdin!"

Geneva flips automatically to the correct page and I run my fingers through 'A Whole New World'. The man beside Brandon, Chris (I think), has a startling voice when he sings. It's clear, crisp, and perfectly pitched. The sound of it lures several other patients to the piano where they watch him with admiration. Jasper does the same thing when he hears someone sing. He loves to hear music. He loves to hear singers and watch people dance. He didn't care too much for it before the accident, but now that it has happened ... he listens a little closer to life, he pays more attention to things that sound pretty. Before we discovered that his mural lamp would calm him enough for bed and that he could chase dolphins until he fell into peaceful slumber ... the notes of a music box carried him to sleep. My dad gave it to me when I turned sixteen. It plays 'Over the Rainbow' and its still on Jasper's dresser. He winds it every morning before he will let my mother help him dress.

Sometimes I miss him so much that I wish I had braved the ghost town of Miami to stay with him.

I wish I had kept my word about never leaving him.

I hope that I can bring him back all the way so that he can understand that.

The patients here know every Disney song ever written and they want to hear several more than once. On the faster tunes, they pair off ... girls with girls, guys with guys, girls with guys ... and hold hands as they dance. Geneva stays beside me, even when doctors and nurses start to filter in. They're all still wearing their scrubs and start playing around with the patients. I could play all night because the enthusiasm is infectious, but dinner time arrives and everyone groans when I close the lid on the piano. I make eleven promises to do it again before I leave and join Erica at one of the tables. Geneva sits beside me, her elbow rubbing mine as she picks at her hot dog. I half listen to the conversation Erica is having with Jim about the transport van breaking down. I'm distracted because Geneva is moving the fingers of her left hand over the edge of the table like she's stroking the keys of the piano. They're long and graceful and I realize as I watch that only three of her fingers move properly. The other two have been fused into a claw like position that she doesn't seem to have any control over. Even hooked in a curve, her fingers were clearly skilled at one time and I think she knows how to read sheet music.

I haven't heard her voice so I'm a little shocked when she taps me on the arm and says, "You love music."

I really don't love music. It's one of those things that you take for granted if it's a huge part of your life. It would be like having a pet monkey that you're used to so it's no big deal, but people who visit for the first time are amazed. I like some bands more than others and jam out in the OR, but it's not my life. Not the way it is her life. I still nod at her and say, "I do."

"Long long time ago ... I play."

"You did?" I ask, but I knew that. It's obvious. Her passion is just too profound.

She nods and one of the tight curls on her head falls over her face. She pushes it back with her gnarled hand and grins a little. It's just the hint of a smile, though, like she's afraid that showing her teeth will somehow erase her memories. "I play all the time. Long long time ago."

I can't ask her what happened because she gets up and moves to sit next to one of the nurses, who helps her cut her hot dog into bite sized pieces. Erica, who was listening to our conversation, leans a little closer to me and says, "Geneva was planning to go Julliard when she graduated. Her boyfriend took offense to her leaving Washington and beat her with an aluminum bat. She suffered a stroke on the operating table that affected the left side of her body. Her short term memory is shot, but she can remember playing. She can remember what her life was like, but she can't get it back. Ever."

I meet Erica's eyes and she nods across the room. "Riley, the kid in the blue, he was a star athlete. He was on the pitcher's mound one day and when the batter who was up nailed the ball ... it hit him in temple. During the surgery to relieve pressure on his brain ... something happened. He can't talk now. He can't read or write, but he puts that dirty baseball cap on every single day and no matter how many new ones I give him for Christmas ... he only wears that one. It's the one he wore the day he was hit. I think maybe he plays ball all day long in his head. And that smile never, ever leaves his face."

Riley is handsome. When he sees us looking at him, he waves and holds up a hamburger, rubbing his belly like it's the best thing he's ever eaten.

"This was Rachel's baby," Erica continues. "She was a social worker who got tired of watching people with handicaps be bounced around in the system. She started support groups and planned activities like this so that they could look forward to something. The Rachel Phillips Center is in Sammamish. The eleven people in this room live at that facility year round and work here at the hospital. They get paid, they learn how to be self sufficient, and enjoy themselves. Which they do, by the way ... just the way they are."

Rachel. Phillips.

My eyes move toward Jim and now I can see why his ultra bright smile is vaguely familiar. He has Rachel's smile. And her last name.

Yes ... it would have been really fucking nice to know who Jim Phillips was beforehand so I could have had the panic attack then as opposed to now.

I'm slightly irritated, but I don't let it show. I can't let it show because Brandon flops down beside me and points at the piano. I'm actually relieved that I have something to do. I don't say anything to Erica as I get to my feet. The second Geneva sees me move, she leaps up and follows me, sitting next to me on the bench again. When she asks for Beethoven ... there is no sheet music. I play 'Moonlight Sonata' and 'Fur Elise' from memory. I play Pachelbel and Bach while everyone finishes eating and then I return to the Disney formula and try not to think about the fact that I don't know anything about the woman I've moved in with. The great love of Erica's life made it her life's mission to help people like Jasper and that explains so much ... and complicates so much more.

The mental image I had of Erica connecting with Jasper on some cosmic level or because she was somehow better than anyone else is shot to hell now.

Jasper was easy for her because she's used to it. Bottom line. There's no great, mystical, or profound rationing behind how well she gets him.

I didn't bring anything new into her life with Jazz ... she was accustomed to it.

I play until my fingers ache from it while Chris holds court with his beautiful singing voice. He knows every word and sings with passion and conviction about living 'Under the Sea'. He breezes through 'Hakuna Matata', the 'Circle of Life' and 'I Just Can't Wait To Be King' like he was made to sing them all. He could have starred on Broadway in another life ... if his limitations didn't leave him stuck in a group home in Sammamish, Washington ... he could be accepting a Tony award.

I don't want this kind of life for Jasper. If Erica brought me here to reinforce her stance on leaving well enough alone ... she didn't. It's had the opposite effect on me. I'm more determined than ever to make sure that Jasper has something more to look forward to than finger painting and dancing slightly off balance. There's more to life than that. There's more to life than this.

Chris leans against the piano when I wrap up 'Can You Feel The Love Tonight' and says, "You sing."

"Yeah," Geneva says, "You sing now."

"Me?" I ask with a laugh. "I play ... I don't sing."

Just like that, Chris looks like he's about to cry and I quickly change my position. "Okay, okay. I'll sing. Any requests?"

"Anything," Chris replies, wiping at his eyes dramatically. "Okay?"

Tenth grade.

Talent show.

I was forced to perform and the front row in the audience was comprised of jocks, cheerleaders, and the rest of the popular crowd. They kept distracting me by flipping me birds and commenting ... loudly ... on the fact that my stomach was very, very pudgy in the tight dress my mother chose. I mangled the lyrics, messed up the tempo of the song, and nearly burst into tears when it was finally over ... and Jasper stood up in his chair and yelled 'Woo! That's my sister!' as loud as he could. I started laughing and kept laughing with the audience as I bowed and left the stage.

Jasper loves 'Over The Rainbow'. He watched 'The Wizard of Oz' almost daily growing up and after the accident ... he still watches it fanatically. He gets lost in the colors and sounds.

So I play it now for him and the lyrics couldn't be more fitting.

I want to help him fly.

I'm going to help him fly.

He'll never wonder why he can't soar the way bluebirds do.

When I finish the song ... I realize that there's silence.

Possibly ... it was that bad.

I move my hands from the keys and my face gets so hot that I know it's crimson and everyone starts clapping. Chris apparently lost his battle with tears because he's crying when he slugs me on the shoulder and Geneva is staring at me like I just brought about world peace with my bare hands. It's a nice song to end with so I don't attempt to play anything else and the party is winding to a close anyway. I watch Geneva as she closes the cover over the keys and I wonder if Jasper has ever run his fingers over a skateboard with the same reverence that she has. I wonder if he can remember how it felt to do an ollie or slice the wind during that first drop over the ramp. I wonder ... if he misses it the way she misses music.

I wonder if Derek Shepherd can slice through Jasper's brain and fix it.

I find myself shaking a ton of hands and making small talk with the doctors and nurses who are still filing in to take part of the 'Summer Smash'. Erica doesn't touch me or do anything to make it obvious that we're a couple. When I get a little too close to her ... she takes a step back or goes to refill her glass of punch. It makes me sad that she couldn't live out loud at Seattle Presbyterian (and still can't apparently) and I'd give my right arm to hear myself introduced as something more than her 'friend from Seattle Grace'. I don't particularly want to be called a girl ... but I'd much rather hear that word preface friend because it diminishes so much to NOT hear it. It reduces me to acquaintance and not who I really am. Which is supposedly her GIRLFRIEND.

It puts me in an unbelievably bad mood and I find myself replaying the conversation I had with Addison during lunch over and over in my head. Addison doesn't see what I see in Erica ... and Addison is causing me to look a little closer at Yellow ... and I don't like what I'm seeing. Or thinking. Or feeling.

When Riley's baseball cap is knocked off by a playful Brandon and he throws a chair in retaliation ... the festivities officially end. The staff begins to wrangle up the happy party people and get them ready for their trip to Sammamish. I find myself folding tablecloths with Jim and my nerves fray around the edges when I realize that he's watching me very closely. When I hand him my end of the table cloth we're folding together, he says, "Erica told me about your brother. He sounds like an amazing guy."

"He is," I reply. "He's unbelievable."

"If you ever want to bring him out to see us ... we'd love to meet him."

The 'us' he is referring to is the group home that bears Rachel's name. "Thanks. I'll keep that in mind."

He smiles that haunting smile that I see in the hallway everyday. "Erica's happier than I've seen in a long time. She talks about you nonstop and she laughs a lot more than she did when she worked at the hospital here. You're good for her."

I don't know what to say. Jim doesn't seem to mind my silence because he adds, "My sister would have loved you. Rachel would have been singing your praises just as pretty as you sang that song."

"Erica's told me enough to make me think it would be a mutual admiration society," I give him a sad smile. "I'm really sorry for your loss. By all accounts, she was a wonderful woman."

He pats me on the arm and gathers up the arm load of cloths we folded. "Thanks, Callie. For coming and for taking care of her."

"Anytime."

Even if I'm slightly pissed and uncomfortable ... I mean it.

Erica and I say goodnight and head to her car. I slip into the passenger seat and wave at a couple of doctors who greeted me earlier. When she pays the fee for parking ... she takes my hand. I look down at our entwined fingers and wonder if she really thinks they're so ugly together that she doesn't want to show all of her old co-workers how they contrast. My feelings are definitely hurt and I'm angry. With me ... that's a deadly combination so I bite back on the urge to point out that Erica blindsiding me with Rachel's brother, not telling me where we were going or what we were doing, and why she understands Jasper so well wasn't very amusing.

"You never told me that you could sing like that," she finally says, cutting through the quiet. "I was stunned."

"There's a lot of that going around." I can see that she glances my way, but I don't explain.

"You didn't touch your dinner. You want to stop somewhere?"

"No."

"Hey." She shakes my hand a little, tightening her grip as if she can sense that she needs to make up for lost time. "What's wrong?"

I look out the window, watching the bad side of town slowly become the good side of town. There's a line of demarcation in the asphalt where the boarded up windows stop and brightly decorated shop windows begin. I wonder how often people stand on the 'bad' side and watch people prance around the good side without a care in the world. As much as I lived on the 'good' side of Miami ... I didn't close my eyes when we drove through the worst areas. I was never blind.

Erica ... Erica may be blind. How could she not know that pulling me into Rachel's world would be jarring? How could she not see that I was perfectly fine to labor under the illusion that her bond with Jasper was somehow bigger than all of us, that it was a sign that this was meant to be. Why would she think that I'd enjoy being called her 'friend from Seattle Grace' enough times to make me believe that the line of demarcation between the good and the bad part of town somehow split the two of us. She's mine on the good side ... and not on the bad. We're out and then in. In and then out. Closets open and shut and we ride a revolving door so much that I'm confused about whether or not we are or we aren't ... together. Or maybe we're always together, but the fear of another broken windshield keeps us from venturing very far into the world and shouting it from the rafters.

Being her 'friend from Seattle Grace' and having her stand the official friendship six inches from me when I wasn't at the piano has given me a headache.

"Did someone say something to you that you need to tell me? Callie?"

"No."

"Then you're mad at me." She states it as fact, as something that can't be disputed.

Her voice is sexy. It's smooth and sultry and deep. She has a tendency to draw words out a little longer than she should and I've never been to the Midwest, but it makes me wonder if that particular trait is something regional ... like my mother's Southern twang. I guess I ponder her vocal tendencies a little too long because she pulls off the side of the road, parallel parking in front of a specialty shop. She keeps the engine running because of the heat and clears her throat twice until I look at her.

"I'm not going anywhere until you tell me what's wrong."

Saved by the bell. My phone rings and I recognize the tone as my brother Joel's. I fish my Blackberry from my purse and answer. "Hey, Joel."

"So, Dad's on the warpath because I went through all of Jasper's medical files and got everything out of order," he says by way of greeting. "And because he's yelled at me for an hour I thought I'd pay it forward."

"What do you have to yell at me about?"

"Well, nothing yet, but I'm sure I will if you talk long enough," he laughs. "How are you?"

"Are you drinking?"

"No, why?"

"Because you're being less of an ass to me. Oh, god ... has something happened?!"

"No. Just wanted to talk to you. I'm sorry I have to miss your big birthday bash tomorrow, but our parents are flying out first thing in the morning with a couple of presents for you. I hope you like it."

BIRTHDAY BASH! SHIT! I WILL KILL WHOEVER THE FUCK DID THIS.

I don't say that to my preacher brother. What I say is, "Oh, I see how it is. Chicken shit."

"I don't fly, sweets. If God had intended us to fly ... he would have given us our angel wings now instead of when we're dead. Are you okay? You don't sound like a sparkly birthday girl in the making."

"I'm tired," I reply. "Someone vandalized my car yesterday, but don't you dare tell our parents that. They think Red Rover simply died."

"Vandalized?"

"Imagine the worst thing possible that you can do to a car and multiply that by ten. It even came complete with hate speech."

"Oh," he replies softly. "I'm sorry. I'm really ... sorry ... about ... everything. I'll try harder ... you know ... to be okay ... with this ... thing. With Erica. I suppose she's not ... revolting. Well, I mean, she's moderately revolting because of the whole sin thing ... but ... if you like her ... I'll try to not think about that. Not that I actively think about you ... and sex ... but ... I'm sorry. And I'll try. I really will."

When my brother Joel stumbles over his words ... it's usually because he means them enough to pick them carefully. I have to smile a little. He's never apologized to me unless he was forced by my father. When he choked me that one time he followed his apology by kicking me hard enough in the shin to give me a hairline fracture. Our relationship has always been far from loving. I'm oddly touched by his pregnant paused apology. "That was the best birthday present you could have given me."

"Yeah, well ... I try."

I hear him telling Trevor to stop climbing on the China cabinet and laugh. "Give the brats a kiss for me."

"No way. Savvy has chicken pox and I've never had it."

"Oooooh! You're screwed."

"I know. I guess I should go. Happy birthday, Calico."

He hasn't called me that since I turned part of my hair orange with a home bleaching kit. That's a walk down memory lane that I never hope to revisit. Talk about humiliation. That ranks right up there with Donnie Wahlberg smelling my morning breath. "See ya, J."

I hang up the phone and stick it back in my purse. Erica has waited patiently for me to finish up the call. She hasn't budged the car and she reaches for my hand again. I let her take it and say, "I'm exhausted."

"Tell me what's wrong."

"Nothing." I shake my head and meet her eyes. "Everything's fine."

"No, it's not."

"Please ... let's just go home."

"I said no," she snaps. Her voice is a warning to me that her fuse is very, very close to sparking. "If you're mad at me then tell me! Put your big girl pants on and say something instead of sitting there like a little kid in the time out chair! Talk!"

My fuse has run out. "Where do you want me to start!? Do you want me to tell you that I didn't particularly enjoy realizing that I was face to face with Rachel's brother until halfway through the night? Or maybe I should tell you that being introduced as your 'friend' doesn't exactly sit well with me since we've fought with everyone and ourselves to finally get to call it something more. I know ... why don't I tell you that as much as I value your opinion about Jasper ... you don't get to have one now. You're biased as hell and you don't see anything wrong with a half life because she didn't. I'm not her."

Erica's face falls more with every word and when I finish my mini-tirade ... her mouth is slack and her blue eyes are sparkling in the streetlight. She doesn't reply and seeing her that way makes me want to apologize for every single thing I just said, but she straightens up in her seat, puts her seatbelt back on, and drives back onto the road. It's not her usual easy pace. She drives fast and when she turns onto the street she ... no ... we ... live on fifteen minutes later the tires bark in protest. I grab the door handle and brace myself for the turn into the drive on two wheels, but she slows down a little. It's bumpier than usual, but she doesn't scare me. She parks in the garage and slams the door the same way she did the night she picked me up at Joe's. I watch her go into the house and slump back against the seat.

We never, ever fought when we were friends. Not like this. Never like this.

I spent months after we first touched in Miami building her up in my head. I never saw her as having flaws or shortcomings. She was something unattainable, something forbidden and perfect. I wanted her the way any person wants what they can't have ... with every fiber of my being. There are parts of being with her that are better than my wildest dreams could have cooked up. She's sexier, gentler. I feel safer with her than I ever have in my life and I'm also happier than I've ever been.

But maybe I built her up too much during the endless days I spent with nothing on my mind except her. Maybe all the endless moments spent wanting her and picturing a life with her has made it impossible for her to live up to that standard.

Maybe I put too much stock in my own overactive imagination and not enough in reality because I never, ever imagined being this pissed at her. Ever.

A movement catches my attention and pulls me from my thoughts. Erica yanks my car door open and glares down at me. "Did it occur to you that I don't have to introduce you as anything other than my friend because I didn't know if you were ready for that? And maybe I didn't tell you about Jim because I didn't want you to be any more nervous than you already were because I hate watching you be uncomfortable. And here's a newsflash for you, Cal, I know you're not her. I don't want you to be her. I'm so fucking glad that you're you and you're HERE that I can't stand it. So ... get over it. We're not going to bed mad. I mean it!"

If Addison could see Erica like this ... her nostrils flared, her hair a little wild from running her hands through it, her cheeks flushed with anger ... then there would be no question why I chose Erica over Mark. We have pure, unadulterated, and heavy passion between us. It's undeniable. I can't be mad enough at her to stop wanting her ... even for a second.

My heart does a flip in my chest when she holds her hand out to me. Damn my fucking betraying ass mushy emotions because ... I put mine in hers.

I step into her arms and hug her, my face against her neck.

I'm great at holding a grudge.

But I'm even better at holding her.

Which I do ... for a long time.

I've never been in a relationship where I can convince myself that I'm very pissed off one minute ... only to have my significant other convince me that I'm not a minute later. That's exactly how it is with her though. I build up a raging inferno of anger and she cracks into the fire hydrant and sprays me down with water before I let it consume me. I can't go to bed pissed at her because I can't STAY pissed at her. I just ... can't.

We fought too long and too hard to get to where we are to let anger at each other do us in.

Erica keeps teaching me things ... and maybe the greatest lesson I've learned so far is how to meet someone half way.

I can smell a Pop Tart from twenty miles away. If I had to be stuck on a deserted island for the rest of my life ... all I would need to be perfectly happy is Erica, a stack of comic books, and a lifetime supply of Pop Tarts. Any flavor, every flavor, any way I can get them. Jasper and I used to stay in trouble for going through an entire box in one day. Any time my mother went to the grocery store and brought them home ... it was open season and we'd join together to find new and exciting ways to sneak the loot from the kitchen. I'd distract Mom so he could scale the cabinet and find them or he would distract her so that I could hunt them down. We also used the pastries as currency when we absolutely had to. If I had the last one ... Jasper could be coerced into doing my share of kitchen duty and vice versa. They're my crack. Not getting my daily fix can dictate whether I'll be in a good mood or not.

It's the smell of warm strawberry goodness that wakes me up and I breathe deep when Erica holds out a plate to me. She has put a mountain of whipped cream on both Pop Tarts and I smile when she lights the two skinny candles that are stuck down into the white fluff. "Happy birthday. Make a wish."

I close my eyes and wish to feel the way I feel right now ... for the rest of my life. I blow out the candles and pluck them from the whipped cream, licking the sweet off them. I notice that her eyes are a little red from tossing and turning most of the night so I put the plate down on the bed and take her hand. "We should talk."

She nods. "Yeah, we should."

"Do you want to go first?"

Her eyes move over my face in that way she always looks at me, like she's taking in every freckle, every pore. "Growing up ... I listened to my parents fight all the time. We're not as bad as they were, Callie, but it feels like all we do is argue about everything and we need to stop. I won't live this way and I won't let you live this way either. We have to do better."

"We really do. We will."

"And you have to stop bringing Rachel into everything. That's not fair."

"Okay," I tell her, tightening my grip on her hand. "My turn. You can introduce me as your girlfriend or your partner or whatever else you want to call me as long as it's not friend. I graduated from that a long time ago and I want everyone to know that we're together and we're happy. I like living out more than in."

"That's fine." She brushes a strand of hair from my forehead and kisses me there. "Hmmm. I don't like partner. What else could I call you that would be fitting?"

"Sex goddess? Willing slave? Perverted pal?" As I talk, I unbutton her shirt and she doesn't try to stop me. She watches with an amused expression as I expose her breasts and dip my finger into the whipped cream. I slather it over her nipple, then repeat the process on the other. Before I lean down to lick it off, I say, "How about Latin lover?"

She catches me before I can clean the mess I've made, resting her hands on my cheeks. "One more thing."

"You better hurry before I drool."

"No matter what happens today ... you cannot be pissed at me. Deal?"

"Are you perhaps referring to the fact that my parents are on their way to a surprise party that I didn't want?" I dip my finger back into the whipped cream and wipe a little onto her bottom lip. "I won't get mad ... I'll just get even."

"Who told you!?" she demands. "Addison? Yang!? I knew Yang would blab like a freakin' asshole! I'm going to -"

She stops in mid rant because I close my mouth around her nipple, sucking off the sticky sweetness. I move to the other, running my tongue around and around until it's clean as well, then I smile up at her. "It's my birthday so what I say goes, right?"

"I thought you were my willing slave. Not the other way around."

"You have on way too many clothes. So, if you repeat that little strip tease you did in Cristina's apartment ... I'm sure I'll be satisfied all day."

"You want to be satisfied alllll day?" She slowly pushes herself to her knees and puts her hands on my shoulders, coaxing me back against the bed. "Dancing horizontally is guaranteed to do that."

"I dunno ... I really did like the strip tease."

Her hand moves between my legs and she hooks her fingers into my panties, pushing them aside to expose me. One long finger runs along my center and she smiles when I lick my lips in anticipation. "You know what I really like, Callie?"

I shake my head at her.

She moves her hand away from me, forcing me to bite my lip in silent protest. I watch as she scoops up two finger fulls of whipped cream and holds it up. "I like making you squirm."

The whipped cream is cool against my skin when she spreads it over me. My breath hitches in anticipation when she stretches out on her stomach with her head between my legs. The path she takes is excruciatingly slow and by the time I feel her breath exactly where I want it ... I've got the comforter balled up in my fists. Her tongue is hot when she swipes away some of the cream and it feels so damn good that I can barely stand it. She knows what's she doing. She definitely knows how and where to touch me to make my spine curve and my hips lift against her face. When she latches onto my throbbing clit, I grip a handful of her hair and hold her against me, relishing the feel of her fingers digging into my thighs. I get off so hard that I can't make any sound at first ... but she remedies that by slipping her fingers into me and curling upward. Back to back orgasms are never, ever silent.

By the time I've returned the favor ... the whipped cream is gone and we're both so sticky that our hair is matted to our cheeks. She picks up one of the Pop Tarts and says, "Do you still want this?"

"Nope." I kiss her neck. "In case you haven't figured it out yet ... the key to making me eat a well balanced meal ... is lots and lots of orgasms. I'm very agreeable afterwards."

"Is that right?"

"Yeah. If you were to, you know, wake me up with sex ... I'd probably eat oatmeal. And if you pulled me into an on call room before lunch ... I'd probably eat a salad. And then at dinner time ... well ... the possibilities are endless." I wink at her. "Just thought you should know."

"I'll introduce you as my sex addict. How's that?"

"Complaining?"

"Not on your life." She kisses me. It's sweet and tangy and pretty fucking sexy. "Do you want your birthday present now or do you want to wait for the party?"

"I'll wait." I shoot her a look. "It'll make me less pissed at you for this entire thing."

"It wasn't my idea. Your mother suggested it and Addison agreed that we should go for it."

"Where is this brilliant scheme being hatched? Here?"

"At Joe's."

"Well, at least there will be alcohol to help get me through the festivities."

"You won't need it." She gets to her feet and extends a hand to me. "Shower?"

It's while she's scrubbing my back that I realize it's too easy.

Life with her is too damn easy.

Being totally content and perfectly happy is throwing me off my game because I'm not used to it. I keep feeling like every relaxed moment with her is the calm before the storm and I shouldn't do that. It's not fair to either one of us.

I have to do better.


	17. Chapter 17

I've never liked my birthday.

It happens in the summer so I was deprived of the fun of taking cupcakes to school for my classmates. Not that I had friends who would have appreciated it or anything, but other kids got to be King or Queen for a day in our classroom. They got to wear a little tiara or big crown and pass out paperwork and pick the book to be read before naptime. I resented that those kids had a normal birthday. My parties were always on the beach with my immediate family around me. My mother stopped lying about why none of my classmates could come after a while. I think she even stopped inviting them by middle school. I was weird and tall and different from the other kids. It was a bitter pill for her to swallow and when she eventually got it down I was in high school and she stopped having a party at all. She'd simply cook my favorite foods all day and shower me with what she perceived as enough presents to make up for the lack of gifts from anyone else. Most people count the days to their birthday, but I counted the ones afterward ... thinking that being sixteen, seventeen, eighteen ... would be so much different and better.

It never was.

Until now.

I have decided to embrace the fact that I'm a year older and wiser. I'm in the happiest place I've ever been and if Erica wants to throw a birthday party for me then I am going to be really friggin' grateful that she cares enough to do that. I will dance, eat cake, be merry, and appreciative because I finally have someone who wants to be a part of my life. She wants to celebrate that I'm here. Finally ... there is someone who appreciates me.

Erica hasn't told me all the details of the little get together at Joe's because she wants some element of surprise there. I don't bother telling her that I hate surprises or that being the center of attention could very easily cause another ulcer. I let her have her fun because it obviously means a lot to her and when she suggests that I wear my sexy black dress with spaghetti straps because she wants a picture of me in it ... I agree. I have to admit ... the dress makes me feel like a million bucks and I love the way it hugs my body. I curl my hair in loose waves so that I don't look like a Gothic Shirley Temple and rub glittery lotion on my arms and shoulders before we leave for the festivities. The almost argument we had the night before has both of us on our best behavior. She went so far as to cook me a grilled cheese for lunch even though I was more than willing to eat Caesar salad with her. And I think I've told her I love her about a million times because not saying it ... even for a second ... feels like too much wasted time.

While we wait for the garage door to open, she leans toward me and gives me a kiss. "You look beautiful, Callie."

"So do you," I tell her. She does. She's wearing slim black pants that sit low on her hips and a tight red shirt that defies all the laws of modesty. It's incredibly nice, sleeveless and low cut. Her cleavage may be the death of me. I've never seen her in red unless you count the red scrubs she wore once, but I didn't know her then. I also never dreamed that such a sexy article of clothing could have escaped notice in the closet that we share. She doesn't do sexy. She's not a school marm, but she's not a vixen either ... but now she is. It's unreal and I can't decide if I like this new Erica or want her to wear a jacket to keep anyone else from liking it. "The shirt is pretty hot."

"It's yours," she replies. "You don't mind, do you?"

I look at the top a little closer. "I don't think that's mine."

"It's definitely not mine. I've never bought a Versace anything."

"It's driving me crazy." I take my seatbelt off and lean over the console, kissing her neck, then her mouth. She stops the car and puts both of her hands on my face, smiling at me before she returns the kiss with enough ferocity that I can barely breathe when she pulls back. "I think we should be late, Yellow."

"Bite your tongue, baby."

"You bite it for me."

She does and my legs start to tingle when she slides her hand over my thigh and under my skirt. She moves to my backside and makes a face. "No panties! Jesus, Torres! How am I supposed to drive us there!?"

"We could skip the party entirely and you could take this dress off me and -"

"Get back in your seat before I agree." She lets me go and points at the passenger side. "I promised your mother that you would show up and that you would have a nice time."

"I could have a better time here."

"Let's compromise." She pulls me down for another kiss, her thumb on my jaw. "You go to this party, pretend to be surprised, and laugh a whole lot so your mother sees that you're happy ... and I'll do anything and everything you want when we get home. Repeatedly."

"Blue panties," I tell her. "Strip tease. And a lap dance."

She chuckles. "You like my blue panties?"

"Your blue panties haunt me in my sleep." I slide my fingers through the ends of her straightened hair. Her lips are darker than usual and if she's ever looked prettier ... I can't recall. Her skin is smooth and she's mine. I think the realization that I finally have what I want pulls a confession from me. "I'm so scared that I'm going to wake up and find out that this has been a dream. I feel like I've been waiting my whole life to find you and you're finally here. I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be and you're everything I ever wanted. And I keep trying to fuck it up. I'm sorry about last night. I really -"

"Shhh." She rests her finger over my lips. "You don't have to apologize again, Cal. I know. And I've been waiting my whole life for you, too. You're safe with me. You know that, right?"

I nod. "I do know that."

"Sit down. I want to give you something."

I slide back into my seat after kissing her one more time and put my seatbelt on. She opens the console and takes out a small box wrapped in silver paper. "Oooooh! Presents!"

I expect to find earrings because she lost one of my favorite pairs, but when I open the box ... there are two rings inside it, platinum eternity bands. One is accented with round rubies and the other is accented with round yellow diamonds. My heart feels like a sunburst in my chest and the fluttering of butterflies in my stomach makes me grin like a nervous school girl. What these rings mean ... it's commitment. It's forever. "They're beautiful. Our birthstones, right?"

"Not really. November is topaz, but I didn't want to get you a topaz ring. You're a diamond girl." She takes the yellow ring from the box and looks at it. "The ruby one is mine. I want everyone to know that I have someone and that I'm happy. I'm sure people can look at me and see it, but I want to wear you all the time. I don't need to stand in front of a preacher or sign a paper to know that I want to spend the rest of my life with you. You are my life and I love you more than you will ever know. So, if you want to wear this now or wait a while and do it when you're ready -"

"I'm ready now." She has made me cry and I did not wear waterproof mascara so I probably look like a skunk by now. I pluck the ruby ring from the box and take her left hand. "This past year was the best and worst of my entire life. I never stopped wanting you. You nearly killed me and I was so miserable without you that I kept digging my own grave. The only times I felt alive ... were stolen moments with you. I know how much you love me, Erica, because I love you that much, too. You were put on this earth to find me and I'm really, really glad that you did. And I don't want to wait another second for anything."

She's crying too and when I slide the ring onto her finger and kiss her hand, it's trembling. She thought that I would say no and she has every right to think that. I haven't been sure with her. After our first night together in Miami ... I freaked out. I moved in with Mark and then refused to move in with her. So, she has every right to worry about and fear my responses, but I'm never going to let her doubt me, or us, again. I watch her slide my ring into place and smile at the way it looks with my bracelet. It's like a matching set and the yellow looks great against my tanned skin. Yellow has become my favorite color, actually. "Perfect fit," she says.

"Yeah," I tell her. "We are."

"People will say it's really fast."

"They wouldn't if they knew that I've been with you in my heart since Miami. Hell, before Miami. I've been yours the entire time, Erica."

So, we wind up being late despite Erica's penchant for being early for everything. The Lexus has a great hood for sex ... great hood. If you don't count the part where I slid off it and almost sent us both toppling to the ground ... it was mindblowingly perfect. We have to go back inside the house and freshen up and I groan when I see the damage to my makeup. I wash my face and start over and we turn onto the main road at the precise moment that I'm supposed to be making my grand entrance at Joe's. I'm sure my mother is wringing her hands and pacing like a mad woman while she watches the door. She would worry the stripes off a zebra if she could get hold of one. She invents things to fret over. When Erica's phone rings and she clears her throat, I don't have to wonder who it is. I listen to her one word answers and roll my eyes. If I didn't know about the party ... her responses would definitely clue me in. And my mother talks so loud that I can hear every word she says.

Erica tells her that we'll be there in fifteen minutes and speeds up.

I rub my thumb against the diamonds on the bottom of my ring. It's more beautiful than anything I've ever seen and I watch the light from the setting sun bounce off the stones. There are rainbows and slivers of light that reflect my happiness perfectly. I wanted Erica Hahn with every fiber of my being and she's here, she's real, and she loves me, too. It may be my birthday, but I'm going to be celebrating what we have tonight at Joe's instead. I'm not a year older ... I'm a year better because she has made me become a better person. She gets us to The Emerald City Bar in just under fifteen minutes and parks in the first spot nearest the door. There's a reserved sign there that I've never paid attention to before. When I see that it says 'This spot belongs to Callie Torres, Birthday Girl' ... I have to groan at the cheesiness of it all. And the fact that they actually thought they could surprise me. I'm not blind.

Erica unfastens my seatbelt and kisses me again. I could taste her all night, but we're already late and the sooner we get in and get our party on the faster we can go. I let my finger trail over her cleavage and lick my lips, aware that she's watching my every move. "When we get home, Yellow, I'm going to show you just how flexible I am. You will be amazed."

"I'm already amazed."

"Your sweet talk is very, very nice."

"When we get home, Cal, I'm going to show you something else that's very, very nice."

"Can I have a hint?"

"You will beg for seconds." She opens her car door and goes around to the trunk. I'm pondering all the possibilities of seconds when she knocks on the window. Her hands are laden down with festive bags and I quickly jump out to help her. She refuses to let me and I glare down at the mountains of presents in shock. "What?" she asks innocently. "I can spoil you if I want to."

"Erica!" I don't even try to count the number of gifts she has amassed. Apparently my girlfriend has decided to pick up the same slack that my mother picked up for years. Odds are she invited a ton of people and that same ton of people declined the invitation. "Are you insane?"

"There you are!" Addison suddenly cries in a loud voice. "CALLIE, YOU MADE IT! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CALLIE."

Subtlety has never been my friend's strongest suit. She announced my arrival for the benefit of the handful of people who are waiting to surprise me. It's possible that Addison is the only guest in attendance other than my family and that's perfectly fine with me. I can't help but wonder though ... what it would be like to have a circle of friends instead of the couple that I constantly fall in and out of love/hate with. When you convince yourself that you don't like people, you really do it because people don't like you and it hurts less to say it first. You make yourself an outcast before anyone else can do it for you because you can at least save face when it happens. It's just easier to be self effacing or to carry a tough exterior around ... even when that tough outer shell buckles your legs under the weight of it. The best part about being with Erica ... reason number 494893 that I'm glad she's mine ... is that she helps me take off one piece of that armor at a time and loves the rough spots under it until it's easier to accept that I'm me. And I'm flawed, but not unlovable.

Addison rushes forward to hug me and I wrinkle my nose. "What is up with your hair?"

She pats the ringlet curls on her head and glares at me. "Your mother has been in town for four hours and someone had to entertain her!"

I feign shock. "My mother is here!?"

Addy looks at me, then at Erica and claps a hand over her mouth. "Oh shit!"

Erica gives her a wry smile. It's a smile that can curl my toes in the blink of an eye. Clearing her throat, she says, "I won't hold your inability to keep a secret against you, Addison. After all, you did dress like Little Orphan Annie for the festivities. Are you going to sing for us, too?"

Addison stares down at her red dress and scowls. "That's exactly what I told Lori Anne! You owe me BIG for keeping her occupied, Erica. BIG."

"I'm not combing out those curls for you," Erica replies. "However, since I did force you to babysit Lori Anne ... I will help you burn the dress."

Grinning, Addy holds out her hand to help with the packages. "That's a date!"

"No, it's not," I interject, putting my hand in Erica's free one. "She's taken and I'll pull your hair out."

"Ooooh! You wanna pee on her to mark your territory?" Addison winks at me and heads toward the front door of Joe's. "You guys look nice, by the way."

I'm too occupied with kissing Erica to reply right away and I hear Addy groan behind us and mumble something about getting a room. I chuckle and take a step back, grinning at my girlfriend. "You ready to party?"

"I suppose. Addy is right ... you do look nice."

"I'm not nice. I'm very, very naughty." I hug her and take her hand again. "Wanna go back to the car so I can show you?"

"No, Miss Nymph, I do not. We're already late. Come on."

Addison has disappeared into the bar and two things happen at once when I open the door. Flashbulbs blind me and the thunderous roar of 'HAPPY BIRTHDAY' is too loud to only come from the handful of people that I expected. I blink a few times to clear the white spots I'm seeing and gasp. The last person I expected to see celebrating anything other than my death is Mark Sloan, but he's standing next to Derek Shepherd and Meredith Grey. Cristina, Alex, and a few X-ray technicians are clustered near the bar and Louise O'Malley is standing with Lexie, George, Ronnie and Jerry. Chief Webber and Adele are next to my parents and Jim Phillips, Rachel's brother, has an arm around Jasper's shoulders. Miranda is happily chatting with an anesthesiologist that I always pick for my procedures and my favorite scrub nurse is grinning as she talks to two EMT's. My eyes move from the impressive crowd to the big banner over the bar that says, 'Happy Birthday, Callie'.

To say that I'm stunned ... that would be an understatement. I'm also highly embarrassed and more than a little uncomfortable, but my mother hurries forward and wraps me in a hug so the moment passes. My dad lifts me off my feet when he hugs me and I'm shocked because he's never done that and I'm not exactly a lightweight, but I can feel his muscles under his shirt and raise a brow. "I've been working out," he tells me. "Nothing like almost dying to make you rethink your decisions."

"He had a gym put in the house," my mother says, one arm around Erica's waist. "And that's the first place he goes every day. He won't eat anything good, either. Just endless bowls of salad and grilled chicken."

"Mom ... that is good," I say.

"You ADMIT it!" Erica says.

My dad steps around me to hug Erica and I watch him kiss her cheek and whisper something in her ear. She gave him a second lease on life. Erica pulled him back from the brink of death and put him on a much different path. She did the same thing for me. I was existing. I was drawing breath, eating, sleeping, working, but I wasn't living. Now ... when I breathe ... it's because I'm not ready to leave her anytime soon ... and I love my life. The difference in existing and living is the vast ocean of loneliness that people swim in, where hopelessness creeps into your dreams and you tread water until you sink. If you're lucky, someone comes along and pulls you out of that ocean and shows you what you were made for. For the first time in my life ... I don't doubt why I'm here. Hell, now I want to celebrate my birth because clarity makes me sensitive and full of revelry.

Jasper's exuberant greeting ... where he acts like my Dad and lifts me off my feet ... causes everyone in the vicinity to laugh because while he's hanging onto me he says, "Be on time, Lee! Cake now!"

The party theme is The Flash, one of my favorite DC Comic characters of all time. When I turned twelve, I wanted The Flash on everything, but my mother refused and decorated the beach with sunflowers instead. I'm pretty sure I told Erica this story when she asked me why I hated sunflowers. This was obviously information that Erica stored to use against me later because the party is over the top, but very nicely done. Yellow and red balloons, streamers, and comic books are everywhere. I would possibly be moderately embarrassed if I didn't overhear Derek explaining why Superman could have easily kicked Spiderman's ass. Ahhh, the universal language. You can put a million cliques together and they can still speak fluent comic. At least the cool cliques.

I eventually make my way around the room, thanking people for coming and making small talk. I purposely avoid Mark, but when I run out of people to greet, I see him staring at me. It's a stare. It's not a glare. It's definitely not inviting or charming. It's just a blank slate that I don't particularly enjoy. I actually contemplate walking back across the room, but I hear him clear his throat, then he takes a step towards me. Every awkward moment I had growing up ... food stuck in my braces, my underwear showing during P.E., tripping at graduation, forgetting lyrics during the talent show, becoming deaf and mute when a guy talked to me ... none of that really prepared me for this moment. Being responsible for destroying someone's happiness for the sake of your own ... that's a different kind of discomfort. It all comes down to knowing that you left an immeasurable scar on someone's heart ... a heart that they trusted you with. It's watching someone wear their heart on their sleeve ... and then hide it behind thick walls of anger that apologies and tears won't penetrate. I hurt him. The fact that I was able to hurt Mark Sloan is the most insane part of the entire situation because I'm not his type ... only I was. And I don't know if hurting him will be something either one of us can forgive me for.

"Hey." I wish I had pockets. I suddenly don't know what to do with my hands. If I hold them behind my back, it looks like I'm hiding something. If I hold them in front of me then it looks like I'm trying to be prim and proper ... which the idea of that is too laughable to even contemplate. So, I let them dangle like dead fish at my sides thinking maybe that looks a little apologetic. "How are you?"

Okay, so maybe asking the person you obliterated how they are is akin to detonating four nuclear bombs right next to their open wound, but I didn't exactly think of that before I said it. I watch his jaw tighten and the way his eyes narrow slightly on my face. "I'm only here because Addison threatened me. And ... well, I bought you a birthday present months ago. Before you left me for Screech over there."

"Screech?" I shake my head at him. "That's not a really good cut down. You're losing your fire."

He sighs. It's the hollow, bitter sound of defeat. It's not aggravation or anger. It's that last breath before the fire you've been clinging to is finally extinguished. "Yeah, I guess I am."

I watch him run a hand over his face the way he always does before a big surgery, like he can push the tension from his body by wiping the frown off his features. As much as I enjoyed a lot of my life with him ... I'd go back in time and undo it right now if I thought that it could help him. Saying that I'm sorry or that I never meant to hurt him reeks of platitudes and self effacing maneuvers ... and the truth is ... I'm not sorry enough to be truly apologetic because you should never apologize for following your heart. Even if you stepped on another one to get there. That makes me a pretty shitty person, but I can't be sorry for that either. If you live your life for someone else ... the resentment will eventually eat you alive. "You and me," I say, "we never would have worked out. I'm into comic books and you think Archie and Jughead was a rock group from the seventies."

He smiles a little. It's small and unimpressive, but it's dancing around the corner of his mouth. "There is that. Plus ... you think football games have innings and actually asked me why they don't wear catcher's mitts. That was a sure sign that we were doomed."

"No, Mark, the sure sign was the fact that you own every Jack Black movie known to man. I have standards."

"Says the woman who wanted to have Superman's symbol tattooed on her ass."

"All right ... I'll give you that one. I've changed it to Wonder Woman."

He flashes me the all-American, movie star smile that has been known to make panties catch on fire. "If you need me to inspect the artistic integrity ... I'll be glad to."

I laugh at him, punching him on the arm.

It's not back to how it was. It's pretty far removed from how it was ... but this is the start that I've been silently begging for since the day I walked out of his life. I can almost almost almost call him a friend again. Almost, but not quite. It's good enough for now.

My mother didn't bother to interrupt my conversation with Mark while I was sweating bullets and praying for the floor to open up and swallow me, but the second we're laughing comfortably she rescues me with a lame excuse about cutting my birthday cake. Okay, maybe that's not a lame excuse, but if her timing could have been just a little better then my dress would not be clinging to me from dehydrating under the heavy blanket of awkward that was wrapped around me tight enough to cut off my circulation. The cake is jumbo sized, The Flash running in his yellow and scarlet ensemble. I point out that he's well endowed, earning a swat to my backside from my Mom, who turns red. I cut the cake so that his crotch is snipped out perfectly and hold it out to her, smiling, and I rest comfortably in the knowledge that I paid her back. She's purple from embarrassment and I wink at her, then lick the icing off my finger.

Erica's plastic fork clatters to the ground beside me and I look at her. She tries to be inconspicuous about retrieving it. When she stands up and tosses it into the trash, I hand her another one. "Feeling clumsy?"

"Stop licking yourself," she tells me through gritted teeth.

I look down at my cake, then back at her. Slowly, deliberately, and with far too much enjoyment, I swipe my finger through the frosting again. I swear she's not breathing when I bring it to my mouth and slide my tongue out for a taste. I can't do all the things I'd like to do to torment her because there are other people in the room who would probably not be as amused as I am, but I do enough. When I've licked the icing off, I take a bite of cake and close my eyes. The sound I make sounds like cake heaven to anyone nearby ... but Erica knows it's the sound I make the first time her tongue slides against me. When my eyes meet hers again ... she's flushed. I can see it spreading over her chest and her breathing has become just a little more ragged. I know exactly what I'm doing to her.

I move in for the kill. "You know what we did the whipped cream this morning, Yellow?" Dipping my finger in the icing again, I hold it up. "It could almost be body paint. And it's pretty thick so that would take a really, really long time to clean up. Don't you think?"

Something sparks in her eyes. Before I can bring my finger to my mouth ... she takes it into hers and I kid you not ... I nearly lose my balance. My legs go weak, my breath tears at my lungs, but won't escape, and my mouth drops open in shock ... and desire. When she releases my finger, she grins at me. "Play with fire, baby, and you will get burned."

She never even has to struggle for the upper hand. She constantly has it and the truly pathetic part is that I don't mind at all. Her eyes twinkle a little in the glow from the jukebox and I watch her smack her lips playfully as she savors the sweet confection. I don't even debate it. I can't. I lean forward and kiss her. If my mother has congestive heart failure over the entire thing ... at least Erica knows what to do. Her lips are warm and pliant under mine, but she raises her hand to my face after a split second and returns the kiss easily. When we break apart, I rub my nose against hers and am about to go in for a second time, but Jasper interrupts us to say, "Naughty, naughty!"

Erica chuckles and pokes him in the side, causing him to giggle. I can see my mother out of the corner of my eye. She's got a hand on her chest and her mouth is slightly ajar in that Southern 'I can not believe you just did that' way that I'm very used to. If we weren't surrounded by people she would pull me outside by my ear and possibly try to spank me. I don't think she realized that we were OUT of the closet all the way. I think that the idea of being openly ... different ... in front of people you work with has never crossed her mind as a possibility. I'm almost tempted to tell her that women's lib has never felt more rewarding to a person than it does for me, but I refrain. My father, who can sense my mother's altered state of mind from a mile away, puts his hand on my elbow and says, "Sweetheart, you should open your presents."

He's trying to prevent me from doing anything that would make my mother go into a state of catatonia. I have to admire him for that. I let him lead me to the table where the gifts have been piled and quickly unwrap everything from new Wii games, to comic books, to computer programs, to a really nice dress from Addison. My wonderful friend refuses to embrace the geeky side of me, but that's perfectly fine. I'll wear her dress and make her happy. My favorite gift, hands down, is the Rubik's Cube from Karev. That's a gift that keeps on giving. I attempt to help my mother clean up wrapping paper and am quickly shooed away. I give Jasper money for the jukebox and watch him press random numbers. God, he plays everything from Hootie and the Blowfish to Patsy Cline. He's content to stand and watch the flashing lights as it plays his songs so I leave him to it.

Cristina hands me a shot and says, "I can't believe your girlfriend bought Joe's for a night."

Obviously my eyes widen in shock and I gape at her like a freak, choking on my shot. "What?!"

"Yeah, she basically made the rules and made it clear that if we wanted to come and drink we had to bring you a birthday present and eat cake."

"Are you SERIOUS!?" I wheeze, still choking.

"That's not the best part. The best part ... is that she told Izzie they'd find her in pieces if she tried to gatecrash this little shindig."

"Did you just say shindig?"

Cristina shrugs innocently and refills my shot glass. She holds hers up and says, "To ... Hahn's softer side. She's still pretty damn abrasive, but she hasn't drawn blood lately. So ... cheers."

I can drink to that. I don't choke on the second shot. I enjoying the slow burn that works its way down my throat and settles in my stomach. The best part of Tequila ... is that burn. I'm about to enjoy my third shot when Lexie Grey nearly tramples me on her way to the bathroom. One hand is over her mouth and she's green, a color that would give Elphaba a run for her money in Wicked. George goes after her, giving me a deranged look as he says, "She was so freaked out about meeting my mother that she hasn't stopped drinking once."

"That's not gonna make a good first impression," I tell him.

He looks toward his mother and nods at me. "Tell me about it. She thinks I made you gay, Izzie crazy, and Lexie an alcoholic."

I pat him on the shoulder as he scurries to the bathroom. I can't take too much pleasure in karma biting him on the ass because I'm pretty much due for some karmic kicking for what I did to Mark, but I take a little delight in the fact that Mrs. O'Malley thinks that Izzie is a few eggs short of a dozen. I down my third shot and decline more because I didn't eat anything except junk for dinner and Tequila is notoriously intoxicating for me. I move to where Ronnie and Jerry are tossing darts. Jerry tells me that he's losing and hands me his final dart. I get a bulls eye and he hugs me ... then buys me a shot of whiskey. I don't linger with them long because they're looking for reasons to buy shots and I seem to give them a million reasons by standing there. I wind up talking to Miranda, who tells me she can't stay late, but wants me to know that she's happy for me. I don't have to ask what that means. Mark and Addison are arguing over another dartboard so I skirt past them and draw up short when I see that Derek and my father are sitting at a booth in the corner in deep conversation. Dad has his thinking face on and I'm sure that Derek is explaining the Fellman-Caputo. My suspicions are confirmed when Derek sees me watching, smiles, and motions for me to join them.

My dad is giving me the evil eye he usually reserves for singers like Ashley Simpson or Miley Cyrus... singers who make the sound come out their nose and not their mouth. I slide into the booth next to him and say, "What's up?"

"Dr. Shepherd was just telling me about the extensive vandalism to your car. Is there a reason why you didn't mention this to me?"

I glare at Derek and his eyes register shock, then apprehension. He mouths that he's sorry and I take a deep, calming breath that makes my head spin a little. Damn ... I should have eaten something more substantial than cake and chips. "It's not a big deal. Besides, I needed a new car."

"It would be nice if you could talk to me about things like this, honey," Dad says.

Derek, in a fit of hysteria or possibly suffering from the biggest brain fart known to hit mankind ever, blurts out, "You know what? I was just about to tell your father about the Fellman-Caputo and how Jasper could benefit from it. Santos, Callie has given me all of his medical records and I really think he's a prime candidate. I've been doing a lot of research with her help and -"

"No." Dad clears his throat and shakes his head. I watch him rub his forehead the same way he did when he saw George for the first time. It's agitation mixed with annoyance and a dash of STFU. "I tried to get him in the clinical trial for the Fellman-Caputo at Miami General nine years ago. They said that he would probably die because putting anything into the areas of the brain that have been damaged on him is life threatening."

"You did?" I ask, stunned.

"Yes. And when I heard the statistics, I didn't go through with it."

"Nine years ago the procedure was new and the equipment was large and the technique was too invasive. That's not the case anymore." I put my hand on his and squeeze reassuringly. "They took the size down to the tip of a ballpoint pen and the area of Jasper's brain that needs the stimulation is easier to access thanks to breakthroughs in cadaver dissection. We wouldn't have to go through the important parts to get to where the transmitter needs to be placed. We can go around it."

"Oooh, you did your homework." Derek lifts his beer bottle and takes a sip. "She's right. The Fellman-Caputo is as close to perfect as it will ever be and if we can get approval for the clinical trial -"

"Why is it still a clinical trial if it's been perfected?" My dad can mince words with the best of them. "You are suggesting that I hand my son over to you for a trial that could kill him. You're going to use him to test hypothesis and whether he lives or dies ... you're still going to submit your findings to the national regulatory advisory in the hopes that your data on my son will somehow get your name on the procedure, too. I don't support animal testing and I damn sure don't support using my kids for research or trials."

"But ... you did." I take a deep breath when my father's eyes find mine. He's very volatile when he's like this. "Nine years ago. You were going to do it then. Why not now?"

"Your mother filed for divorce after I insisted that I take him for the evaluation. You didn't know that because I didn't want to upset you, but she was going to cut me out of his life. Out of her life. I was devastated when I got home and their things were packed. She was gone for three weeks and during those three weeks I accepted that trying to change Jazz wasn't worth killing him." He gives me a little smile. "But if you want to brave your mother ... then by all means talk to her about it. If she doesn't kill you for the suggestion then the weeks of silent treatment she gives you will make you wish she had."

I glance toward my mother. She's easy to spot in a crowd and I easily land on her talking to Adele and the Chief. Her hands flutter about animatedly as she engages them in something that is making them both throw their heads back and laugh. If she is telling about me biting a woman's ass at the zoo ... I will DIE. I lift my head a little and say, "I'll talk to her."

"Hmm," Dad chuckles. "Let me know what music you want at your funeral, kitten, because I'll be too distraught to pick anything after she kills you."

I can't reply to that because George hurries into the crowd, looks around, and then spots me. Despite the fact that I'm sitting with my Dad, a man who would clearly kill George at the drop of a hat, O'Malley rushes forward and says, "Callie, can I talk to you? It's about Lexie."

"Oh! Okay." I get to my feet, excusing myself, and George puts his arm under my elbow, tugging me toward the restrooms. "What is it?"

"She's locked herself in there and won't come out."

I shake my head. "Great."

"She likes you," George tells me. "And she doesn't like me very much right now."

"Well, no, George. Of course she doesn't. You will be hard pressed to find any woman who likes you after you let your 'best friend' and 'fuck buddy' plow over them like a steamroller every time she gets a chance. As long as Izzie Stevens gets invited into all your relationships ... you're not gonna have one."

"I don't get it!" he snaps. "Why can't everyone just get along!?"

I don't feel bad for him. And I really don't know what I ever saw in him because he's not the heart in the elevator guy. He's the 'hearts get trampled under my feet' guy. "You watched me go through the exact same thing that Lexie is going through and you didn't do anything about it. I get that you love Stevens. I get that she's your little pal and you have some weird bond thing with her, but if you're not going to be WITH Stevens romantically, then draw a line, George, and tell Stevens not to cross it. Unless you like watching two women regress to petty little kids while they argue over what's best for you."

"No, I don't want them to fight! I don't want anyone to fight."

"Then do something about it!" I want to laugh at how pathetically brain dead he really is, but I don't. "You know what the problem is. You know."

He looks at me, his green eyes haunted. "Izzie. She doesn't play well with others."

"Ding ding ding. Give the boy a prize." I pat him on the shoulder because he looks nauseated. "If you like this girl ... then fight for her. Because she will get exhausted trying to fight for the both of you. I know I did." I reach for the door handle and try it, but it's locked. "Go ask Joe for the key."

I'm not closer to getting Lexie to unlock the door when George returns with it. I slide it into the knob and let myself in, then close the door behind me. The bathroom has four stalls and it's kept impeccably clean. The tiles are always polished and the sinks are always as pristine as the mirrors. "Lexie?"

"Up here."

I look up and sure enough ... she's 'up here'. Her thong covered ass and legs are dangling out the window on the inside, but her torso and arms are on the other side of the narrow passage. I climb onto the table and fight with the second window, finally pushing it open. She turns a little to look at me. She's not wearing her shirt either, just her bra. I shake my head. Interns are so fucking strange. "What are you doing, Lexie?"

"Escaping."

"And your escape plan requires partial nudity?"

"I was afraid that my clothes would get snagged on something."

I let my gaze move over her legs, then ease out the window a little to look at her upper body. "So, what's snagged now?"

"My ass. It won't go through. And I can't get back in."

"Are you in any pain?"

"My pride is definitely killing me. Oh, and some homeless woman grabbed my clothes and took off with them." She groans. "I threw them out the window first."

Interns are definitely fucking strange, but this one is moderately endearing and kind of amusing. "We have a couple of options, Grey. I can try to pull you in or we can call the fire department and look at hot men in uniforms. What's it gonna be?"

"Can't you push me out?"

I move back into the window and look at her ass. There's no way in hell her meaty backside is going through the window. "I don't think so. And even if I could ... I wouldn't suggest running around Seattle at night in your underwear."

"Oh jeez. Pull me back in. Don't call anyone, though. God, this is mortifying."

I move behind her. My face is eye level with her ass as I put my hand on the front of her thighs and gently tug. She doesn't budge an inch. I kick off my heels and brace my foot against the wall for leverage as I pull harder. She starts to wiggle and I see her fingers slide against the mouth of the window as she helps me out. It takes some work and a ton of grunting on both of our parts, but she eventually snakes back through the window. Her face is red and her sides are bleeding from the intense scraping when she's finally freed. I hop off the table and help her down and she quickly covers her breasts with her bra ... it had slid upward, exposing her. Wetting a few paper towels, I squat down to examine a deep scrape on her hip, then rest the cool compress on her side. I repeat the process on her other side, carefully testing her ribs to make sure none are broken.

When the door opens, we both jump in shock. She whirls around and I stand up fast like we were doing something wrong. Erica and my mother are framed in the doorway. Lexie squeals and runs into one of the stalls, causing a wad of bloody towels to drop into the floor. I gesture at it like a demented Vanna White, like it's proof positive that I am completely innocent ... which I am, but it still looked bad. "She, uh, is having a bad night so she tried to go out the window. She got hurt when I pulled her back in."

"I'm sorry," Lexie calls from behind the stall. "I should never be invited to a party. I have a tendency of falling into the cake or passing out drunk in the punch bowl. It's a long standing problem for me."

"Why is she naked?" My mother demands, her hands going to her wide hips. "Calliope?"

The stall opens again and I try hard not to laugh. They'll let anyone be a doctor nowadays. Lexie has covered herself with a box of seat liners, but it wasn't big enough, so she has balanced two rolls of toilet paper over the box to cover her bra. "I threw my clothes out the window like an idiot because I didn't want them to be torn on the way out. My shirt is new."

My mother turns on her heel and stalks out of the room. Erica walks in, glances at me with a look that I can't interpret, and goes into the stall. Lexie groans and leans back against the wall. "I hate my life."

"Why were you escaping?" I ask. "Really?"

"Izzie's pregnant. She was puking at work today. Bailey ordered a set of labs and I got the results." She meets my eyes. "I think ... I think maybe George is the father."

Wow.

"Did you tell him?" I refuse to think about the fact that I thought I would be having a baby with George over a year ago. I refuse to think about the fact that those test could have been mine. Or that I could be a new mother right now with a newborn to look after.

"It's not my place to tell him," she replies. "He slept with me a couple of days ago. And he said that he'd like to try, but -"

My mother bustles into the bathroom carrying a large shirt. I recognize it immediately as the button down that Mark had been wearing. I raise my brows, intrigued. "Mom?"

"He's the only man ought there who out to be shirtless all the time." She holds the shirt out and smiles at Lexie. "There you go, honey. George is ready to take you home. Just between you and me ... you can do much better than that little shit. You're a lovely girl."

Lexie grins at my mother.

Lori Anne Torres has another fan member.

Erica doesn't talk much in the car. She holds my hand and listens to me ramble about how shocked I was for fifteen of the thirty minutes and we fill the rest with a silence that I'd like to call comfortable, but it's not quite. She's too ... withdrawn. I drop my heels in the living room and start to thank her for the party, but when I turn to speak to her, she's picking up my shoes. I watch her carry them toward the bedroom and follow her. She puts them neatly on the shoe rack on my side of the closet and puts her own heels on hers. She doesn't look at me when she turns around. "Uh ... Erica? Are you mad at me?"

Still standing in the closet, she crosses her arms over her chest. "Hmm. Let's see. You got pretty tipsy despite me asking you not to drink. I don't know what that was you were doing with Mark. And then I find you in the bathroom with a naked chick. What do you think?"

I've really never been so stunned.

Or ... shocked ... which is really close to being stunned, but I'm both.

I turn around and sit down on the foot of the bed because I can't believe what she just said and a feather could pretty much obliterate me. Leaning forward, I rest my head in my hands, trying to figure out how every single day leads to an inevitable argument and what I can do to avert this particularly gruesome aspect of our otherwise flawless romance.

I sniffle and nearly jump out of my skin because she speaks from right in front of me and I didn't realize she was right there. "Callie, are you crying?"

"Yes."

"Awww, baby!" She wraps her arms around me and hangs on tight. "I'm just playing with you! I expected you to ask me if something was wrong in the car so that I could freak you out the way you freaked me out last night when you went off on me. I didn't mean it."

I pull back and glare at her. "What!?"

She looks so apologetic when she smudges the wetness under my eyes that I believe her. "It was funny in my head."

"How much did YOU drink, Erica?"

"Nothing. I was driving." She gives me a kiss and smiles at me. "Wanna take a bath? With me?"

"You're bathing me after that! God, I hate it when you're mad at me."

She more than makes up for it in the bathtub and then two more times in the bed. We're lying face to face and her eyes are closed when I say, "Erica?"

"Hmm?"

"Thank you for party. I had a good time."

"You're welcome." Our fingers are already laced, but she readjusts her hand to hold mine tighter. "Goodnight, Cal."

"Erica?"

"Hmm?"

"I need you to do something for me."

"What?"

"Well, I know you don't approve of Jasper's surgery, but I'm gonna be talking to my mother about it tomorrow during lunch. And I'm not asking you to lie and say you think he should get it done ... but if you could maybe not say that he SHOULDN'T get it done ... that wouldn't suck. I really need you to support me because it's gonna be hell and ... I need you."

I feel her thumb against my wrist, rubbing lightly. "I can do that."

Grinning, I lean forward and kiss her. "I love you."

"I love you too. I'd love you more if you'd stop talking, however."

"Erica?"

"WHAT!?"

She tries to sound harsh, but she fails. I can hear her smile even though I can't see it. "Can I ask you something pretty serious?"

"Will you let me sleep after that?"

"Yeah."

"Then ask."

"Do you ever think about kids? Like ... wanting them?"

There's far too much silence and I'm tempted to turn the light on to see her face, but I don't. She either senses my growing tension or sorts through her response, because she finally says, "Yeah, I do. Rachel was actually a foster parent when I met her. She had this great kid named Jacob who could salvage the worst day with just a smile and a kiss. We dated for a year while she had him and we jumped through a ton of red tape so that I could be considered her roommate and have it not affect her parenting status, but in the end it did. They said that his mother was rehabilitated, but I don't think that's the case. His mother drank so much while she was pregnant with him that at four years old he still couldn't walk or say much. I think they just ... knew. About us. They took him during Christmas and he cried all the way down the block."

"Oh my God."

"Yeah, it was pretty unpleasant." She sighs and I move a little closer to her. Her free hand rests on my hip as she speaks again, "We found Rachel's leukemia after she had a complete physical. They did every test under the sun to qualify her for artificial insemination. We had chosen a donor ... a stranger who had a great file ... and we waiting for the green light to proceed. Before she started she had several of her eggs harvested in case the treatments made her infertile ... or in case I wanted to carry a part of her in me. She left me those eggs in her will ... in case I wanted them ... because she didn't want me to NOT have kids."

"You - you can't -"

"No, I can. I just ... don't want to. I've never wanted to incubate and then push a large, squirmy brat through my fun spot."

I chuckle a little, but it's forced. Erica and Rachel had been poised on the edge of forever. They were ready to make the ultimate commitment, ready to culminate their love in the most real way you possibly can and it breaks my heart. And it makes me understand so many things. Erica was uncomfortable with Trevor in Miami because he was a painful reminder of what could have been. I'm not the only one that should have been a mother right now. "I do. Want to push a large, squirmy brat through my fun spot. And ... I would happily use her eggs, Erica. Because she should live on and ... she really had a great smile and maybe our kid would get that. If ... we have one ... one day."

There's another silence and when Erica speaks again, her voice is thick with emotion. "You really are the most amazing human being I've ever known in my life."

"Takes one to know one, Yellow."

"When we have kids, Callie, I want them to be you. I want your hair, your smile, your eyes ... all of that in a little package." Leaning forward, she kisses me. It's slow and sweet and makes my stomach bounce around. Just when it gets good, though, she pulls back and says, "Goodnight, baby."

She said when.

She didn't say IF.

Oh my god.

I'm going to DIE.

I let the reality of it wash over me for a good two minutes before I say, "Erica?"

"I do have a scalpel in my closet and I can cut your tongue out."

"You like my tongue too damn much to do that."

"You have one of those rubber balls that go in a person's mouth in your box of sin over there. I could just use that."

"You've got me there," I tell her, running my hand up her arm and down her breast. "Erica ..."

"What, Calliope!?"

"I'm kinda horny now."

"Box. Of. Sin." She takes my hand and moves it from her breast, depositing it near my crotch. "Or do it the old fashioned way."

"If you insist." I don't touch myself at all, but I certainly sound like I do. When it doesn't have the desired effect, I sit up and start to throw the cover back.

She's on me before I do little more than touch the comforter.

And she's more fun than anything in the box.

We eventually fall into an exhausted, sated sleep, but it doesn't last long.

Something bangs against the front of the house just after two in the morning and we both sit up fast. The glow of brake lights flash against the lace curtains on the window and Erica darts out of the bed, racing for the window. "Someone was out there," she tells me.

I'm already up and have my robe on. She flips on the lamp and kneels down, pulling a box from under the bed. I'm stunned when she pulls out a pistol and expertly slides the clip in place. "Stay in the house," she tells me in passing.

"Like hell!"

She looks agitated when she turns and grabs my hand, but she doesn't say anything. My heart is pounding hard enough to make my ears ring and I realize that I'm shaking when she opens the door. I'd like to think that I'm the opposite of the big chested women in horror movies who can't do anything except scream and trip, but scream is exactly what I do when I see the deer that has been gutted and hung on the porch. Actually ... I think maybe it was gutted ON the porch. Its entrails have spilled all over the steps and I put a hand over my mouth to repress the urge to scream again when she flips the porch light on and I can see the entire gory scene in something more than shadow.

Instead of going outside, she pushes me back inside and shuts the door behind her.

I listen to her call the police and sit down on the sofa as she rustles things in the kitchen. When she puts a cup of tea in front of me I take it, but set it on the table. Ruma and Feo, who came running into the living room after I screamed, don't feel the need to comfort me at all. They sit together in the recliner and regard me like someone who needs to be thoroughly scratched for rousing them from sleep. Erica sits next to me and puts an arm around me. "Something hit the house. I really should go out and see what it -"

"NO! The police are coming. Let them figure out what it was."

The police arrive in under five minutes and even though I am expecting the flash of headlights through the bay window ... I'm actually terrified that whoever hung the deer is back. Erica opens the door before they can knock and I listen to her explain what happened. One of the officers looks at me, then back at her. "Ma'am, have you had a chance to look at your garage?"

"No." Erica shakes her head and I join her, my hand on her back as more of a comfort to myself that her.

"Someone has spray painted a derogatory term there. They've written 'dyke' on your garage in black paint."

It's my car all over again and once again ... that helpless, angry, desolate feeling washes over me.

This is what I feared the day I jumped in the ocean to keep from looking at her the first morning after we made love. When images of Matthew Shepherd and Brandon Teena flashed through my head ... I was thinking of this right here. There are monsters out there who hate people who are 'different' enough to trash their car and vandalize their homes ... and kill them. There are people out there who would want to see me dead because of my lifestyle and because of who I love. They don't care that I'm happy or that I don't want to hurt anyone by loving a woman. All they care about it the fact that I'm not conforming to what they perceive as the right way to be. They care about themselves and believe that I'm somehow a threat to them when I'm not.

And this right here ... would shake me out the door with the police when they finally leave if I didn't know that I was meant to be here.

I hug Erica when the police drive away and she hangs onto me. "This is because of me," I tell her. "Because I insisted that we not stay in the closet and -"

"Callie, they could burn my house down and I wouldn't change a thing."

We hang onto one another for a long time.

The sun eventually rises, but neither of us rush to see the painted hate and rate its artistic merit.

I wait until eight thirty to call Ronnie and Jerry. I tell them what happened and ask if they can dispose of the deer for me. They're hunters and Ronnie doesn't hesitate to say yes. When they arrive in a pickup truck, Louise is with them and she hugs Erica and me at the same time, then takes over in the kitchen. I mostly pick at the pancakes she puts in front of me and Erica does the same thing, but it's nice to have someone there all the same. When they leave ... that's when we decide to go and see the garage door. The cop didn't lie. 'Dyke' has been scrawled over both doors the same way it was written on my car, two letters on each space.

I don't cry until she does and I mostly cry because seeing her fall apart is like someone branding the word on my heart. It hurts.

It promises to be a sunny day in Seattle and it spotlights the cruelty of it beautifully. Birds sing, bees hum as they swoop over the flowers that I helped Erica plant on our last off day, and makes the tears on her cheeks sparkle with anger and rage. She runs her finger over the dent in the siding where the paint can hit the house. That's what we heard and the officers put on gloves and loaded the can into a large zippable bag for fingerprints.

"You're not thinking of moving out are you?"

Even though her voice is timid and shaky, I hear her loud and clear. I walk to where she's standing and wrap my arms around her from behind. My chin rests on her shoulder as we both look at the garage. "The only way I'm moving out is if they burn the house down ... and I'm taking you and our ugly cats with me."

She leans her head against mine and we stand there for a while.

United.

Strong.


	18. Chapter 18

My parents are due to arrive in fifteen minutes and Erica is outside hosing the garage door like water is suddenly the magic ju ju to take spray paint off vinyl. Ronnie and Jerry brought over a pressure washer and attacked the blood on the porch, but I swear I can still see the crimson/brown stains no matter how much bleach I can smell. We'll need to repaint the porch, I think. And the garage doors. Although doing so will just give whoever is trying to torment us a nice fresh canvas. I've stopped thinking that it's Stevens. A woman her size, even a woman who is fucking demented and slightly off kilter, couldn't have lifted that deer. It took Ronnie and Jerry both to remove it and they went on and on about how heavy it was. Whoever did it also had the time and the strength to screw a large hook into the front of the porch. I tell Erica to leave the hook so we can hang a fern or something because if the asshole comes back ... I want them to see that we appreciate their endeavors.

Erica's been busy in the kitchen all morning preparing lunch. I think she cooked a feast because she's upset. Anyone who makes lemonade from scratch, meticulously squeezing lemon after lemon, has a whole list of things to work through. My heart is breaking for her. When Red Rover was trashed ... I felt like I had lost an old reliable buddy who loved me even on my worst days ... even when my lead foot threatened to blow the engine and I hit a few too many curbs. This is our safe haven. And it's been branded as something ugly and wrong when it's anything but that. It's a beautiful house on the outside, with its sprawling wraparound porch and lazy swing that creaks in the corner, but inside ... it's a home. It's OUR home. If someone wants to call me a 'dyke' to my face that's one thing ... that's a punch in the throat waiting to happen and I punch pretty hard ... but this is just the work of a coward and I hate that a coward has wormed under her skin this way. And under mine.

I shut off the spigot and walk toward her. She finally realizes that the water is no longer spraying out when I tap her on the shoulder. She's staring at the damage like it will suddenly reveal the culprit. I hold up a glass of lemonade and say, "My parents will be here any minute."

"I should raise the doors so they won't have to see it." She takes a sip of the drink and holds it back out to me. Her face falls when she looks over my shoulder, though. "Shit. Too late."

I turn around and cringe. My parents have arrived in their standard issue sedan from the rental place and behind them is a flat bed truck with an Infiniti FX strapped to its back. It's the one I said I wanted. The orange color is officially called Autumn Copper and I can tell just by looking at it that it will be loaded to the max with every feature that was available. The garish red ribbon around it clashes with the color and it's more than slightly embarrassing that the two delivery men are gazing at the garage doors with speculative interest. I can feel their gazes move from the words to me and then to Erica and sigh. Word association isn't fun when they're associating you with something dirty. Who I am is not dirty in the least, but what the crude painting on the garage reduces me to is filthy. I hate it. I hear Erica swear under her breath and watch her put the water hose down. She doesn't bother with winding it up. Instead, she goes through the house and opens the garage doors like she originally planned. The disappearance of the vandalism seems to shatter the tense moment because the workmen are out of the truck and are unfastening the chains that hold the Infiniti in place.

My parents are still in the car speaking to one another, but Jasper has gotten out and is trying in his own way to tell me that the new car is mine. This consists of pointing at the shiny vehicle and saying, "You! Lee! You! Like it?" He's holding Buddha in his arms and the red Pomeranian is yipping with contentment, but the dog isn't interested in trying to get to me. The furry bastard summarily ignores me in favor of looking up at Jasper with adoration.

"I like it," I tell my brother, giving him a smile that he buys at face value. He doesn't mention the word that everyone else has seen because he doesn't know that it's wrong. As I watch him bend down to smell some freesias that we planted a few days ago, I wonder if stealing his ignorance to such things would be a worse punishment than leaving him be. He doesn't grasp hate. He doesn't grasp bigotry or narrow mindedness. He sees everyone as his friend and everyone as equal. Jasper Dillon Torres even sees himself as equal. I'm the one who's viewing him under a microscope and finding him flawed. I don't want to write something hateful on his house, though ... I want to open his head and change him. Am I right to want to do that?

When Erica comes out of the garage, Jasper forgets me entirely in favor of being able to be near her. He wraps her in a hug and pats at her hair. Buddha definitely takes offense to that and the playful yipping is replaced by a menacing growl when he recognizes Erica. I leave Jasper chatting with her and walk toward my parents. They get out of the car as the Infiniti is rolled off the truck and I smile, hoping that they can take it for more than what it is, too. "Thank you. You even got the right color, Daddy."

I call him that because it usually melts him into a million pieces, but it doesn't work this time. Daddy is glaring at the garage like the doors are still down. "Who did that?"

"We don't know and we don't need to discuss that in front of our guests." I shoot a pointed look at the men from the car dealership and my Dad takes out his wallet, pressing a couple of hundreds into the driver's hand and thanking them for adjusting their schedule. My mother is doing the silent comfort thing where she cradles my arm in hers and rubs my back with her free hand. It's a move she does at funerals, too, because she doesn't know quite what to say and she knows that she'll be guilty of dying one day herself. And you can't justify or excuse something as rude as the audacity of death. She also knows that I'm hurt and I want nothing more than to put my head in her lap and cry for a while because she's my mother and she probably gets an umbilical tug every single time my world crashes around me. There are tears in her eyes when my dad rejoins us and holds out a set of keys to me. I wait patiently for the delivery truck to drive away and then give him a hug. "I could have bought this. I just ... I haven't had time."

"I wanted to have it ready by last night for your party, but they couldn't install the upgraded stereo until this morning." He kisses the side of my head and says, "Are you okay?"

"Not really." I rub the key fob with my thumb, leaning my head against his shoulder. "We were sleeping when it happened. Something hit the side of the house and we both woke up. They didn't just write that ... they gutted a deer on the front porch."

My mother hisses beside me and I don't have to look at her to know that she's got her hand pressed against her chest in Valdosta, Georgia indignation. If she had a handkerchief, it would be clutched in her hand and she would probably fan herself with it after a second for dramatic effect. She doesn't mean to dramatize, but she wouldn't be Lori Ann if she didn't give her best impression of a wilting damsel waiting for Rhett Butler to sweep her off to the fainting sofa. I'm immune to it. So is my father because he doesn't even look at her. When it doesn't get the desired reaction, Mom marches around us and puts her hands on her hips. "This is too secluded out here. Do you have an alarm system on the house? You need security cameras like we have in Miami. You know that any Tom, Dick, or Harry could just pull their boat right up onto our private beach and ransack our house! It's the same out here in the ... wilderness."

"We're in a subdivision," I point out. "George's mother is three houses down."

Mom looks all around the wooded front yard, craning her neck in exaggeration. "Well, I don't see another house and ... check it out," she doesn't make a sound, "I don't hear anyone nearby, either! So, you have two women in the woods and someone is trespassing with the intent to damage your property. This is the perfect set up for every 'Friday the 13th' movie ever made. What you need is a gun."

"Lori Anne," my father begins.

"A machine gun," Mom makes a hand like a pistol. "Shoot. Shovel. And shut up."

My mother is a staunch Republican and lifetime member of the NRA. She gave me a rifle when I was six. My father hid the bullets and then took the gun out of the top of his closet when it was time to put the one she gave Jasper in its place. I don't know what he did with my rifle after that, but I never shot it. And when I told my mother that I was registering as a Democrat, she wore black for two weeks and threatened me within an inch of my life if I voted for Clinton. I put a Clinton bumper sticker on my car just to freak her out and she sat behind it with a bucket of soapy water and a razor blade until she peeled it off. It didn't matter that she took most of the paint with it. I retaliated by enlisting Jasper's help and we wallpapered her bathroom with Clinton bumper stickers. She contemplated drowning us in the ocean, but she videotaped the carnage and sent it to all of her little Republican friends and I know they laughed about it when they barricaded themselves in the bathroom to peel it all off. It took them two days and the sheetrock had to be replaced. My mother got a nice renovation out of it and a tub big enough to swim in and I got a high five from eight year old Jasper as we folded bumper stickers and put them in all the pockets of the clothing in her closet.

I glance toward my brother and watch him kneel down to run his fingers delicately over several daisies while Erica attempts to salvage her ankles from Buddha. The red demon lunges, feints to the left, then attacks her flip flop, nearly tripping her. Jasper saves her by scooping the mongrel up again and gently stroking his head. Buddha acts like he's royalty in Jazz's arms, panting with contentment, his pink tongue exposed. The fucking dog looks like its smiling and I realize after a few seconds that he's showing his teeth at Erica. Some things never change.

But some things CAN change.

I want the real Jasper back. I want the Jasper who would have seen that word and lost his temper. I want the fighter that he was, the scrappy little boy who beat up a classmate for calling a girl 'fatty'. This placid, docile shell of a man isn't him. I want to know how he would vote. Would he follow our mother's lead or our father's? Would he register as an independent and buck the system? Hell ... would he want to be a politician himself? Is not seeing all the rancid and dirty laundry of the world better than seeing it and having to fold it again and again?

"The cameras are a good idea," Dad says suddenly. "I'll make some calls."

When my Dad makes calls ... things happen. Santos Torres is known. If he wants cameras installed on Erica's property, bars on the windows, and an electric fence erected with a barbed wire top ... it will be done before lunch is over. "You can't do that," I say, "this is Erica's place and -"

"It's our place, Callie," Erica says, joining us. She threads her pinky around mine and adds, "What can't he do?"

Dad doesn't wait for me to reply. "We were talking about cameras. I really think we should have a few installed and it wouldn't hurt to put a gate up at the driveway. We could put a tall fence around this front area, through the woods so it wouldn't be an eyesore and connect it with the privacy fence out back. It could be landscaped in nicely. Do you have a security system?"

"Yes," Erica replies, nodding her head. "And I actually thought about the fence already. We need to do something."

"No, we don't!" I snap. "If we start rearranging everything then whoever is doing this wins. We're having to make concessions and change things and that's what they want. They want to make it hard on us so we change."

"No, we're making it hard on them," Erica says, taking my hand outright now. "Baby, someone came to our house and stood on our porch to hang that deer. I'm not willing to let them get that close again, okay? I mean ... it terrifies me to think of what could have happened if you had worked late at the hospital and came home while it was happening. Or if you were here alone and opened the door thinking it was me. I'm not willing to risk ... you."

I can see my mother's expression out of the corner of my eye. She's regarding Erica like she's suddenly become the Virgin Mary made flesh again. I see her full lips part in adoration, watch her hand creep toward her throat (because that's where it goes when she's verklempt) and I know that Erica just went up about ten points in her book. Possibly more for calling me 'baby'. For the first time, I think maybe my mother gets that we're just as normal as anyone else. We love the exact same way hetero couples love ... only we get nice graffiti and dead animals for our romantic endeavors ... and straight people get power ballads and romantic comedies. When Erica squeezes my hand, I'm pulled from my thoughts and say, "I just think it'll give whoever's doing it some kind of perverse pleasure to know that we had to spend a ton of money to feel safe. That's what they want."

"I'd go bankrupt to keep you safe. Now, moving along ... I really like your new car. It suits you." Erica points at the Infiniti and I know that the decision has been made. There will be no discussing the security measures or making a Pro/Con list. This is how it will be. Our home will become Fort Knox. No ... Fort Bliss. My father, however, will be the one to pay for it. He'll put his foot down and hire the best people he can ... if they have experience in the Secret Service, that will be a plus. It will be a waste of time to argue so I unlock my birthday present and pull the ribbon free from its hood.

Being given a brand new car by your parents when you're well into your thirties is slightly uncomfortable. What can I say? I don't like big gifts. I like small gestures. If my dad had accompanied me to the car dealership to finagle the price I would have been just as happy. I like one flower on my pillow more than a dozen at work and enjoy a note signed with love more than a song dedicated to me. For my dad's benefit, I comment about every aspect of the car and even kick Red Rover's memory by saying that there's no comparison between the two ... even though the plush leather in the Infiniti is nowhere near as comfortable as the worn leather that my Range Rover had. When I park the car in the garage, Erica leaves the doors open and I know that she does it on purpose. We all know it's there. You don't have to see cancer once you've been told you have it. The reminder is in everything else around you. It hangs like a black cloud and the chemotherapy for the garage door will be paint ... but whether or not it stays in remission is entirely up to the person doing this to us. We're at their mercy ... no matter how hard it is for them to get to us. They're already in our blood.

Erica's lunch is well received once we convice Jazz to let Buddha go outside in the back yard to play. The food is amazing. I don't know where Erica found recipes for Cuban food that is so authentic, but she pulls it off flawlessly. By the time we eat bread pudding my father is telling her that she could rival his own mother's abilities in the kitchen. That's a huge complement since my grandmother's cooking is something I remember very fondly. It's during dessert that I realize I haven't mentioned Jasper's surgery. I glance across the table at him, watching him meticulously pull raisins from his pudding and stuff them into his mouth. One of his cheeks has ballooned out and he drools a little, leaving it hanging as he digs for more. My mother follows my line of vision and dabs at his mouth with her napkin, telling him to chew his food. He grins at her and complies and she turns her attention to me. "Calliope?"

Oh Jeez. When my mother says my name that way I've either done something or she's doing her 'I'm a mother and I have sixth sense' thing where she accuses me of something before I can do it. And it's usually something that I've been contemplating. "Yeah, Mom?"

"Your father was laboring under the illusion that you wanted to speak to me about the advances that have been made in this Fellman-Caputo technique. Is that true?"

I glance at my dad and see the smile playing at the corner of his lips. So much for him not going there again. "Yeah," I say.

Mom leans forward a little, resting her elbows on the table. It's a relaxed, comfortable pose for her. It's the same thing that a crocodile does under water when it's waiting for a sweet, docile gazelle to put its innocent little lips down to the water. The second I get too close, I'll lose my head. So, I don't say anything. I wait. She waits, too, watching me with calm intensity. "And?" she finally prompts.

I'm exhausted. Everything that I've researched and read about the Fellman-Caputo has gone straight through a window in my brain and the only thing I can consider at all is that my brother could die. He could become a statistic. My eyes are on him, picturing him in a coffin, when Erica covers my hand with hers and speaks in my place. Her voice is strong when she says, "Callie has spent weeks going over data and information about the surgery and she's right. They have made amazing advancements. As with any surgery there are risks and complications, but the process itself is not as invasive or as dangerous as it previously was. More often than not the patient sees significant change and in several instances a near perfect recovery has been recorded. Combine that with the fact that Derek Shepherd is possibly the best neurosurgeon on the planet and you'll see that Jasper would be in good hands and Seattle Grace is an outstanding hospital." Pausing, Erica takes a deep breath. "Callie's a doctor and because of that she knows that the potential for recovery is there. We're trained to recover. We're trained to heal. But she's also his sister and it's that love for him that makes the risk worth it. Knowing what she knows, she still thinks that Jasper ... the Jasper she remembers ... would want to be more than what he is now."

Damn.

When I asked her to support me ... I didn't know that she would go so above and beyond that request. She has said everything I wanted to say so succinctly and so beautifully that I'm tempted to kiss her, to cry, and to profess how much I love her to everyone present ... like they can't already see it. I think a blind person would still see it. I can't help but smile at her, but she doesn't look at me.

"More," Jasper demands. He holds up his bowl, however. He wants more pudding. Not more out of life ... only ... he would if he could tell us.

My mother gives him another spoonful of dessert and sets it front of him. He roots through it in search of raisins and noisily licks his fingers, smacking his lips in appreciation. I watch my mother dab at his mouth with her napkin again. I choose my words carefully before I speak. "You know what I think of sometimes when I look at him?" I ask no one particular. "I think of innocent people who are sent to prison and twenty years go by and suddenly they're cleared with new evidence. They're released and they get out of jail and go home. Jasper's been in prison for fifteen years and there's new evidence that could clear him, too." I meet my mother's eyes. "You won't live forever, Mom. He's gonna go and live with Joel when you die and Joel will sign for him to have this surgery. Now, you can let Jazz serve fifteen years and let him out or you can make him wait another twenty. The difference is ... if it works now ... then you get to see him come back. If you make us wait until you're dead ... you don't."

"And if he dies?" Mom counters, tilting her head ever so slightly.

"It would destroy me," I confess. "But so does this."

To prove my point, Jasper pulls his pudding into his lap and laughs, slapping the sticky sweetness on his leg and making it splash a little. The bread topping sticks to his hand and he holds it up, licking. Erica takes his hand and wipes it clean with his napkin and he looks sad that the mess is gone. I watch my mother gaze at him as Erica cleans his face and I know that the gears are turning in her head. Because of that, I strike while the iron is hot. "I have a ton of information about it, Mom. And Derek actually has some video of the procedure if you want to see it. And ... well ... Derek needs an answer fast to meet the deadline for the clinical trial."

"How fast?" Dad asks.

"Days," I reply.

He nods at me and looks at Erica. "Would you mind three very tidy houseguests for a few days, Erica? I'm not comfortable with the idea of you two staying alone until we get the area secured a little better and it will give Lori Anne and Callie the opportunity to discuss Jasper's options."

"You're always welcome here," Erica tells him. "We'd love to have you stay."

And just like that ... my happy family of two becomes five.

When my parents leave to pick up their luggage from the Archfield and take Jasper to the park, I walk onto the front porch and sit down in the swing. I try to imagine a fence blending in with the sprawling freedom of the front yard. Erica told me a while back that the reason she bought this house was because of the view from the back deck and the serenity of the front yard. Right now, you can stare out at trees and flowers and the unblemished beauty of something natural. Once a metal fence goes into place ... all bets are off. Once security cameras dot the trees and brutalize the peaceful tranquility ... it will change. We're going to be living in a cage like there's something wrong with us ... like the fact that we won't conform to what's 'normal' and dared to be deviate means that we can't be free at all. We have to suffer. We have to lock ourselves up.

It's infuriating.

Erica walks onto the porch and I can't help but notice the way her eyes move over the steps, where the deer bled out. It's a disgusting reminder of the way we bled for each other when we weren't together. Every day without her was a fresh wound, another pint of blood lost and I know that it was the same for her. She's told me how she suffered in the aftermath of Miami and I know that we have matching battle scars. When she joins me on the swing, I lean into her open arms and rest my head against hers. "You know what?" she asks softly. "We probably have an hour, possibly two, before they come back. I can think of about a thousand things we could do, but only one thing I'd like to do."

I grin and forget about the fact that I haven't slept since two a.m. or that I still don't know if Jasper will have the surgery. I let my hand rest on her thigh and turn my head a little, rubbing her neck with the tip of my nose. No matter how often I inhale the sweet, lilac scent of her ... it's never enough. I never get tired of it. When I'm at my wit's end all it takes is a look from her to give me perspective. If I'm close to falling apart she can touch me and mend every seam in me to hold me together. No matter how tired I am ... I wouldn't turn down an opportunity to pleasure her ... or have her pleasure me. I kiss the pulse in her neck and say, "I'm guessing it doesn't involve clothing."

"Clothing is definitely optional." She pushes herself to her feet and holds out her hand. "Come on."

I happily follow her to our bedroom and then draw up short when I see the bed. There's a large piece of my birthday cake and two glasses of wine resting on a tray near the foot of it. I hear her shut the door behind me and turn to watch her because she's always the most interesting thing no matter where we are. She toes her shoes off and walks to the radio in the corner, flipping it on. The shorts she has on are modest in every way imaginable, but the way she wears them makes my mouth dry. I don't waste a second pulling my shirt over my head and tossing it into the floor and when my pants rapidly follow, she chuckles a little. Her smile fades when my bra skims over my arms and falls into a heap in the floor and I push my burgundy panties over my thighs. Now she's looking at me hungrily and I enjoy the fact that I have the upper hand for a split second because she's going to grab it back and I know that.

She seizes the upper hand by turning the volume up slightly. "Didn't you ask for a lap dance?"

I nod at her and she taps the bench at the foot of the bed with her hand. I sit down, grinning with anticipation and she doesn't disappoint. Erica Hahn is living proof that when you're sexy ... you're sexy. You can wear an outfit made out of garbage bags and if you work that outfit enough ... it will be breathtaking. She starts with her shirt, which is a nondescript looking peach button down with short sleeves. It's not tight, it's not sheer, it's not anything but normal. However, her long fingers on the button has me thinking that the color is perfect, that the fabric is glorious, and the cut ... is great for coming off easily. She's wearing a tight camisole under the shirt. It's sheer enough that I can see the outline of her nipples and I can see that they've hardened. I'm sure mine have as well. I glance a little lower when her fingers move to the button of her shorts and I say a silent prayer that I'll catch a glimpse of blue as she swings her hips and lowers the zipper.

I. Am. Not. Diappointed.

Blue panties, for the win.

I don't know what music is playing because the only thing I can hear is the steady rush of blood to my head. And when it pumps away from my head ... it's going straight to my groin and setting my nerve endings on fire. Everything is throbbing, everything is pulsing, everything is waiting to be touched and I have to clutch the edges of the bench to keep from tackling her and throwing her onto the bed. Whatever song is playing stops, but she doesn't. She reaches up and runs her fingers through her hair. My own hands become fists at my sides as I watch her pale locks cascade down around her shoulders again. I know the texture fo her hair and I can't take it anymore. I start to get to my feet, but she shakes her head and rests her foot on the bench beside me, bending her knee a little. I lean down and kiss it, letting my fingertips skim over her calf. "You're not allowed to touch during a lap dance, Callie."

"This is an interactive lap dance," I tell her, leaning forward to rub my lips over her turgid nipple. I let my tongue dance against the silk of her camisole and close my eyes when she moans my name. Any time she says it ... it reaches my ears like a melody ... but when she curls the words from her gut in pleasure it's like a supliant plea. It's something I can't deny. I let my fingertips skim over the lacy top of her blue panties and slide under her camisole, barely whispering against her skin. I lift it high enough to free her breasts completely and trace her areola with my tongue, flicking lightly against her nipple. Her hands tangle in my hair and pull my head back, giving her access to my throat which she takes full advantage of. I'm grateful that the bench is covered with a thick cushion because when she straddles me I pull her roughly against me, grinding upward. She tugs her camisole over her head and tosses it, then attacks my mouth with hers, letting her tongue dance over my lips before I open and swirl mine against hers. It's my turn to moan. She tastes sweet and enticing. She's obviously been experimenting with the frosting already.

Breast to breast, I smooth my hands over her back and then down to cup her backside. I squeeze gently and the feel of her flesh under the blue lace is enough to get me off right then and there, but I don't let it. What I do is trace the hem of her panties at the back of her thigh all the way around to the front, where I gently ease the fabric aside and feel her wetness. She's obviously enjoying her little dance as much as I am because my fingers easily part her flesh and slip up into her. The grip she has on my shoulders tightens significantly as she pushes herself up a little and then grinds down against my hand. She rolls her hips in a circle and I look down, watching her undulate against me. Her movements are slow and easy and I move my hand in the opposite direction she's circling, cupping her mons so that her clit can rub against my thumb for friction. She leans down and kisses me again, her tongue mimicking the spiral of her hips.

I can tell by her breathing that she's close. I love being able to kiss her when she comes. I love being face to face with her so that I can feel the breath of relief when the waves crash and her body lets go. It's not the same when my face is buried between her legs. I do enjoy the way her legs tighten on my ears and nearly going bald when she grasps at my hair, but nothing compares to my mouth being on hers when she cries out. She does that now and I let her breathe, content to kiss her ear so I can hear her pant against mine. I can feel the spasms between her legs, feel the shaking in her limbs and I don't have a single doubt in my mind that we're going to die old and happy together. We'll have to. Because I can't live without her.

I protest and try to hang onto her when she gets to her feet. My attempts at holding onto her are futile however and she picks the tray up off the bed, moving it to the end table. I watch her dip her finger into the icing and taste it, then she grins at me and says, "Lie down."

"I was doing something."

"I'm going to do something, too.

"Me?" I ask, although I know the answer.

She humors me. "Only if you get your ass on this bed right now."

I get to my feet and do a pretty good impression of someone being forced to the guillotine. She chuckles, lets me get two feet from her, and then enourages me to move a little faster by shoving me onto the bed. I'm laughing when she covers my body with hers and smiles down at me, her hand on my cheek. "How did my lapdance become my time, Cal?"

I don't know if I've ever seen anyone with bluer eyes. Or prettier skin. And the impish grin she gives me while she waits for me to answer makes me tremble. "You drive me a little bit crazy, Yellow. In case you didn't notice."

"I notice."

Kissing her is easily my favorite pasttime. I love her soft, supple lips and the way she sucks at mine. I love the way hers will puff up and look slightly bruised after a particularly energetic round of making out and the taste of her is always sweet, even after her morning jolt of bitter caffeine. I want to protest when she moves a little lower, concentrating her efforts on my breasts. As much as I love her touching any part of me ... it's kissing her that makes me happiest. I let her move to my belly, enjoying the slow glide of her hair over my flesh, but stop her before she can move between my legs. "Use your fingers," I tell her, shocking myself when I hear how husky my voice is.

She raises a brow, but complies. The moment her fingers move against me ... nothing in the world matters except the two of us and what we have. I let her kneel between my legs until I can't stand it and then I tug at her, pulling her down on top of me. I hook one leg behind hers and lift my hips up to meet her hand. She's kissing me when she pulls my right leg over her shoulder and picks up the pace. It's hard, a little rough, and exactly what I wanted. I'm close to getting off without any further stimulation, but her thumb finds my clit and bears down, massaging with just the right pressure and I explode. I have gotten off many, many times with her, but this is something different. I can't put my finger on it, but having her mouth on mine, her chest against mine, and being able to cling to her when I come is a heady combination. I'll have to make sure she knows that I like this position very, very much. Possibly even more than sixty-nine and that's saying something.

When my eyelids finally flutter open she's gazing down at me. "Stop watching my orgasm face, Erica."

"I can't." She kisses my chin, then my nose. "You liked that."

"Obviously."

I see something flash across her face, but she slowly moves her hand from between my legs before I can ask what she's thinking. And all I can concentrate on is how bereft I feel when gets to her feet. I push myself up on my elbows and watch her pick up a towel, wiping her hand on it. I'm confused when she holds it out to me, but that confusion doesn't last. She turns her back to me and I see the scratch marks on her pale skin where I drew blood without even realizing it. I leap to my feet and press the towel against her abraded flesh. "Oh my God! I am so sorry."

She glances at me over her shoulder, smirking a little. "I can take it."

I gasp. "You liked that! Freak!"

"It's means I've still got it."

"There's no threat of you losing it." She still has her panties on and I take a moment to admire her backside before I kiss her neck. "Did you have something specific in mind with the cake?"

"Use your imagination."

I do.

And it's a mad dash to get dressed when we play a little too long and hear Jasper laughing in the front yard. We pull our clothes on over the worst of the icing and I grimace when my shirt sticks to my belly. Erica and I freshen up as best we can in the bathroom, tripping over Ruma and Feo, who dart under our feet into the living room. By the time we get to the door, my mother has a knowing look on her face and my father pretends to believe me when I say we dozed off. We've kept our new pets in the master bathroom because my mother has never been fond of cats and when she sees the hairless wonders she looks repulsed. It's Jasper's reaction that takes us all off guard, though. He happily darts into the room, showing Erica a Troll doll with green hair.

He draws up short when Feo meows.

I bend down and pick the cat up, scratching him behind the ear. "Look, Jazz. Cat."

My brother's mouth opens in a perfect circle and he screams. He is absolutely petrified of the black cat I'm holding and when Erica bends down and picks up Ruma, who regards Jasper with his deep blue eyes, my brother loses his mind. He screams again, runs a hand over his own shorn head and points. "Bad! No! BAD! NO CAT!"

"It's okay, Buddy," I tell him, holding Feo a little closer to me because the noise is agitating him. "He's nice. Good kitty."

"UGLY!" Jasper bellows. "UGLY UGLY UGLY!"

It's the first time in fifteen years ... that my brother has ever judged anything as ugly that I can remember.

Feo meows again and his long, sinewy tail swings like a pendulum. Jazz reaches one shaking finger out and touches that soft velvety tail, then screams again and blows out the front door like a madman. I glance at Erica, "He doesn't like our babies."

"Honey, if those are your babies," my mom says, "get sterilized now."

"They're cute," I tell her, rubbing Ruma under the chin. He purrs and rubs his head against my palm. "Very cute."

"Eye exams really are thorough nowadays," my dad tells me, regarding the cats with abhorrence. "Did you pay full price for these bald things or did you get a discount?"

"I hope she didn't pay anything for them at all," Mom says. "They look like Science projects that went back. I'm surprised the entire house isn't glowing with radiation or something."

"Leave them alone!" I tell my parents. "You'll give them a complex."

The next few days should be interesting.

The night starts off with a bang when Buddha sees the cats through the sliding glass door and tries to barrel through it until my Dad finally gets him and puts him in the room Jasper will be using.

The dog barks for over an hour.

The cats hiss outside the door until Erica shuts them in our room.

And Jasper flat refuses to come back around the 'ugly' until he gets up close and personal with a few mosquitos. Then and only then does he come inside. His eyes dart left to right, though, as he tells my mother that he wants to sleep now. I help her give him a bath and get him settled into bed with Buddha ever loyal at his side. I can tell that the cats have agitated him and I watch him run the fingers of one hand over the dog and his free hand over his own hair. "Jazz, do you like your hair?"

"No hair!" he snaps, his voice angrier than I can ever remember hearing. "Jazz no hair!"

"You want hair?"

"Want hair!" he cries, tugging at Buddha's hair gently. "Booty has it."

The dog moves a little closer, snuggling down beside his face. Jasper rests his cheek against the furball and I glance at my mother. "I think he wants you to not cut his hair anymore."

"Well, I'll be." She runs her hand over his buzz cut. "I'll let it alone and see what happens."

Even small victories are good things.

Addison is so upset about the deer the following morning that her face turns even redder than her hair. I meet her in the cafeteria for coffee and Mark joins us when he sees the state she's in. I listen to her sputter the tale and try not to cringe until the intense scrutiny he places me under a moment later. "They gutted a deer?" he says, clearly stunned. "At your house?"

I'm a little stunned that he's choosing to sit near me and actually interact civilly, since I kinda thought the party was a fluke, but I roll with it. "They did. Whoever they may be."

Mark frowns and I squirm a little, uncomfortable with the topic, with talking to him, with life. "Jesus Christ, Callie."

"I see your 'Jesus Christ' and raise you a 'Holy Mary Mother of God'." I reply, glancing out at the sea of scrubs around me. Knowing that someone wants to go out of their way to hurt you is more than just a little scary. I've caught myself looking twice at anyone I suspect is looking at me. I've been doing a mental inventory all morning, trying to add names and faces to my tiny suspect list ... which technically still only has Izzie Stevens on it. As far fetched as it is to suspect her at this point ... I still think it would hurt less to have someone who openly hates me be the culprit instead of thinking that it could be the coffee cart guy who went out of his way to ask about my weekend like he wanted to hear ALL the dirt. "The police are investigating."

Mark shakes his head. "What if the two of you had arrived home while it was happening? I mean, this person obviously had a knife. They could have killed you to keep you quiet and -"

"Oh my GOD!" Addison slaps him on the arm like the mere suggestion that I could have been gutted alongside the deer is a capitol offense. "Don't say that!"

"It's the truth!" He tells her. "Anything could've happened. Someone who would trespass isn't someone who cares too much about laws."

"He's right," I tell her. "My parents are having security enhancements installed as we speak. I was pissed about the cameras and fence at first, but I had a very vivid nightmare last night about the entire thing so the taller the fence ... the better."

"Aww, Callie." Addy puts her hand on mine, patting it reassuringly. "Can I do anything?"

"No and that's the worst part. Whoever's doing this has the upper hand." I sip my coffee and sigh. "Obsessing over it is going to kill me so I have to stop."

"Not obsessing enough can get you killed," Mark tells me. "You need to be careful. The car thing ... that could be chalked up to a prank. This thing that happened at your house ... that's something else altogether. That's your HOUSE. You and Erica ... you just need to be careful, Callie, because people are a little bit crazy. Okay?"

I nod at him, smiling more for myself than him.

He's accepted it.

In his own Sloan way, he's come to terms with my decision and can acknowledge that my house is Erica's house. He can be genuinely concerned about me and want the best for me. Having Bambi gutted on the porch is almost worth it for this moment right here. THIS is my friend Mark and it's nice to see him again. "I really dread being out there alone."

"Talk to Richard," advises Addy. "Tell him what's going on and make sure you and Erica keep the same schedule for a while."

That's not a bad idea, I decide. Paranoia is not generally something that I experience ... well, unless you count how paranoid I was that my husband was cheating and look how right that turned out to be. I don't want to have to make any more concessions or ask for special treatment at work because someone is an asshole, but I don't see a lot of other options. I take out my Blackberry and send Richard an email, requesting a few minutes later in the day. My pager goes off just as I press send and when I hear the echoes of several others around me I know that there's a trauma inbound. The andrenalin rush more than makes up for keeping my nose pressed to the books for so long in medical school.

Saving lives.

It's cathartic.

I wind up in a twelve hour surgery that forces me to skip lunch in favor of salvaging what I can of a four car pileup. I flit in and out of operating rooms as I mend bones. I don't scrub in with Erica, but she winds up working with Mark which tempts me to grill Cristina about how it went, but I don't go there. If Erica wants to tell me about her surgery with Mark she is more than welcome to bend my ear. I'm searching for her so that we can head home when she texts that she's in the parking lot. That's the last place she needs to be alone and I tell her so. We drove my Infiniti because no one recognizes it and parked it on the top level where Webber has a bullseye view of it (something I touched on in my meeting with him). She's leaning against the back bumper when I step out of the elevator and I have to grin at her. She's got my iPod in her ears and she's trying to make sense of the music there. I take it out of her hand and chuckle when I see that she's listening to an audiobook of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. She's twenty minutes into it and I shake my head, plucking a bud from her ear. I kiss her cheek and say, "Will you please just read the first book, Yellow?"

"They're children's books," she replies, resting her hands on my hips. "You're the only person I know who would have Showtunes, Gospel, Marilyn Manson, and Harry Potter on their iPod."

"It's called being eclectic. If you would break out of your adult contemporary shell, you would appreciate that."

"I happen to like being a contemporary adult." She gives me a kiss, then pulls me back for another. "How was your day?"

"I'm starving," I reply. "And my mother cooked so prepare to help me degrease the kitchen."

"After the day I've had," she tells me, "I'm more than ready to clog my arteries."

"What happened?" I ask. She's still leaning against the back bumper and it makes her a little shorter than me, which is new. "Spill it."

"Well, I had a really rough surgery that required a lot of movement and I was clawed by a wildcat so operating was a painful exercise of will."

"Ha ha. Very funny."

She grins at me, that crooked one where she doesn't show her teeth. "Plus, I'm pretty sure we can rule O'Malley out as the father of Steven's spawn. Lexie decided to announce during surgery that Stevens couldn't assist Savoy because she had morning sickness and Savoy dropped his scalpel. Then he dropped his second scalpel and had to take a break. Something tells me he's a little bit worried."

"Savoy and Stevens? That's like ... Beavis and Butthead procreating. Eww." I make a face. "That's like ... Children of the Corn meets Village of the Damned."

"Stevens dropping trou should make all penises in the vicinity look like a pushed in elevator button."

I shudder, trying to erase the image of the two Blonde baracudas of Seattle Grace going at it. "That truly is making the two backed beast, huh?"

She nods. "Let's go home."

"And deal with my parents who YOU allowed to move in with us."

I have to admit that driving the new car is not that bad in the least. It turns on a dime and the ride is so much smoother than Red Rover could produce even after a tire rotation and balance. Erica is fascinated with the stereo and navigation systems, which she assures me is much more user friendly than the one in her Lexus. When we went out of town to the spa months ago, her GPS kept us lost and thoroughly entertained for an entire day. She programs our home address into mine now as I head in that direction and what I find waiting for us at the driveway is enough to make me lose my appetite. Several trees have been cut down and a tall, imposing white fence is doing anything but blending in with the landscaping. Black would have blended. Dark green would have blended, too, but white looks like we're trying and failing to live a white picket fence life and that makes my stomach ache. I pull into the driveway and see that a small unit has been installed with a keypad and camera, but the front gate has not been secured so there's no need to stop. I hate it. I despise it. I want to scream at the top of my lungs that it's insanity to live in fear, but I don't. I head to the garage and realize right away that the doors have not been repainted ... they've been replaced. The style is different and it's not ugly by any stretch of the imagination, but it's new. It's different. And I don't appreciate my father changing anything that Erica established before me.

The last thing I would ever want is to for my presence to upset her life.

I don't look at her. I can tell that she's taking in our new surroundings as well as she can in the waning light of day. I park right in front of the house since I can't open the garage door and shut the engine off. "I hate this," I finally tell her. "It's not right and -"

"It's not going to be that bad. Look on the bright side ... at least we can sit in the house and screen our visitors. It'll be like having caller ID with pictures." She pushes a strand of hair off my cheek, tucking it behind my ear. "Callie?"

"What?"

"It could be worse."

"How?"

"Our cats could actually have mange and not really be hairless. And we could catch it."

"This is why I love you, Erica. You can always put life into perspective."

We go inside to find that my mother has definitely been busy in the kitchen. She's cooked everything under the sun and I eat hearily despite the nagging ball of apprehension that the winds of change have blown in. When I help my mother tuck Jasper in and kiss him on the head, she looks at me across his still form. We're both kneeling next to the bed because we both helped him pray and I brace myself for whatever it is she wants to say to me. She doesn't disappoint.

"I spoke with Dr. Shepherd today," Mom tells me. "We're taking Jasper to the hospital tomorrow for a check up and to discuss the procedure a little further."

My eyes widen and I nod at her. "That's good."

"I don't always trust medicine." Her hand rests on Jasper's leg as she gazes down at his face. "I've spend the past fifteen years asking God to help him and God has helped him, Callie. Doctors said that he would never walk again. They said that he would not talk, he would not feel, he would not heal. I had faith and look what God has done. Jasper may not be the Jasper we remember, but he worked his ass off to get to where he is. I'm proud of him. If this is all that he can ever be ... I'm proud of him."

"I know that, Mom."

"I trust you." Her eyes find mine again. "If you think that this surgery can help him then I'm going to have an open mind and I'm going to listen to everything that Dr. Shepherd has to say to me. But I want you to understand that this is my baby we're talking about and I'm not making any guarantees."

"That's good enough for me."

She holds her hand out and I rest mine in hers. A second later, Jasper's hand covers both of ours. He quickly closes his eyes when he catches me looking at him and I tickle his side. "You're supposed to be asleep, buddy."

"You talk!" he tells me. "Loud!"

I goose him again and he giggles. "I love you, Jazz."

"Love you, Lee. Shhh! Quiet!" he points his finger at me, smile fading. "Sleep now."

"Okay, okay," I tell him, patting his chest. Buddha sticks his nose out from under the cover and licks my hand, then rests his head on Jasper's shoulder. I watch my brother turn onto his side and cradle the dog loosely in his arms. He's no longer chasing dolphins before bedtime. Buddha is his dolphin, his friend, and the comfort he needs to lie in the dark. I wonder if Erica knows how much she's impacted the two most important men in my life. She gave my father a second lease and my brother something to keep him safe at night. I need to make certain that she knows how much I appreciate all she has done for us.

My mother is still kneeling beside him when I leave the room.

It's a relief to know that someone else holds the answers now. I can stop debating with myself about whether Jasper should or should not have the operation.

It's out of my hands.

I can smell Erica's soap when I go into our bedroom and don't hesitate when it comes to joining her in the shower. She drops her shampoo when she sees me and I retrieve it, but don't give it back to her. I pour some into my hands and soap her hair myself. She wraps her arms around my waist as I scrub her scalp, scratching with my nails in the way I know she likes. She pulls me under the water with her as she rinses and I'm shocked to feel that she's shaking a little. "You okay?"

"I have a headache," she replies.

"Can I do anything?"

She rubs her hand over my cheek, then down the column of my throat. "What you're doing right now ... keep doing that."

"What am I doing?"

"You're here. That's all I'll ever need." She hugs me, clinging a little tighter than she usually does. "I don't know what I'd do if you ever left me."

"Whoa, hey." It takes a little work, but I finally ease her away from me so I can see her. It shocks me when I realize that she's crying and my heart slams against my ribcage like it wants to flee my body to be closer to hers. "Something's wrong. What is it?"

She opens her mouth, then closes it and shakes her head. "Stress. It's just ... stress. This thing with the deer and Jasper's surgery. I'm a little stressed."

I don't believe her for one second.

But I also refrain from pushing her because she looks like she could shatter at any moment. I bathe fast ... while she leans against the wall watching me.

She curls into my arms as soon as we're in the bed and I massage her back. She trembles against me and I say, "Erica, you know that I'm not going anywhere, right? I'm here for good. Nothing will ever change that. Hell, whoever put that deer out there could hang the entire animal kingdom and I wouldn't care. We're in this together. All the way."

"I know."

"You don't sound convinced."

"I'm just tired, baby.

"Is that all it is? You promise?"

"It's fine."

She doesn't promise.

I am still awake when she relaxes against me and goes to sleep.

The day that Jasper was injured ... I had a sinking feeling that something bad was going to happen. I chalked it up to me being sad about going back to school and leaving him behind. When we boarded the boat and set sail into the horizon, I kept my eyes on the shore until it faded. I shielded my eyes and watched land recede and wondered if I would ever see it again. I knew that something was going to happen. My gut was in knots and when I stretched out on my stomach to work on my tan ... I was really praying.

And it's that feeling, that same sense of foreboding, that keeps my eyes open all night tonight.

Something's coming.

Something big.

I don't sleep at all.

I head into work bleary eyed and out of sorts. After I set two bones and work on a consult with Mark, he gently nudges me toward an on call room and tells me to sleep. It's Mark who shuts out the light and Mark who flips it back on an hour later. He shakes me awake and says, "You need to go to the clinic."

"Why? What's wrong?"

"It's Erica. She's with Addison in room three."

"What happened?" I sit up fast and he holds my shoes out for me. "Mark?"

"Just go."

I've never run faster in my life.


	19. Chapter 19

When you're truly scared, when you race toward the unknown, it's easy to lose your way. I could walk the halls of Seattle Grace in my sleep, but I'm too terrified to remember where the clinic is. The same thing happened once when our house in Miami caught fire. Joel was smoking in his bedroom and even though my father was a drill sargeant who began installing escape routes and fire safety into our heads the moment we could walk ... I lost my way. I was seventeen and Jazz was seven. He found me standing in the hallway, watching fire lap at the wall, and pulled me to my knees, making me crawl with him to safety. And it's Jazz who rescues me again. I see him boarding the elevator with Derek and my parents and I see the large sign to the clinic behind them. They don't notice me since the doors slide closed over the worst of my squeaking tennis shoes as I race toward answers.

Why is she in the clinic? Did someone assault her? Is she sick? Does she have food poisoning? Could she have a migraine? I shove the doors open and skid to a halt, nearly tripping over a baby carrier. I can't remember which room Mark said she was in. Lexie grabs my arm before I can start peeling back curtains and takes me to one of the three private rooms in the clinic. It's where the worst of the cases are taken ... the ones that require more than a curtain to block out the world. It's where you put people ... who need to hide their sickness behind thick walls and a windowless door. I don't knock. I push the door open and see Erica sitting in a hospital gown on the bed. I do a quick inventory. No blood. No tears. No crash cart or EKG. She looks shocked to see me and I grab her shoulders, then her hands. "What's wrong?"

She closes her eyes, unable or unwilling to look at me. I don't know which. "I didn't want to tell you until I knew for sure."

"Knew what for sure? Baby, what?"

Erica nods toward the right and I glance over my shoulder. Addison is standing at the X-ray panel looking at scans. Even from across the room, I can tell exactly what she's looking at. It's a mammogram. I gasp as comprehension washes over me. Erica rubs the back of my hand with her thumb and says, "I just found it last night in the shower. It's not big, but it's there."

My eyes move over the hospital gown she's wearing. It conceals her breasts, but I can picture them in my head perfectly. "Which one?"

"Left."

She doesn't object when I unbutton the left shoulder of her gown. Instead, she takes my hand and guides it to the underside of her exposed breast, letting me feel the small mass for myself. I only touch it for a second, then I pull my hand away like she's burned me. It's absurd that something so tiny could open its ugly jaws and swallow us both whole, but it could. It could kill her ... and me. "Oh God."

"Don't panic," Erica says softly. "Callie, it could be nothing. You know that."

"She's right," Addison tells me, shutting off the light panel. I watch her slide her pen into her pocket and adjust the chart in her hands. "Erica, I'm going to need to biopsy it, which I can do immediately, but the wait is out of my control. I can put a stat on the results, but I'd rather be thorough than fast."

"It's fine. Three to five days." Erica nods as she resnaps the buttons on her gown. "I know."

"I'll go set everything up."

I can feel Addy's eyes on me, but I don't say anything. She puts her hand on my shoulder and squeezes reassuringly and it's enough to make the tears that are threatening to spill actually fall. When she leaves the room, I cradle Erica's face in my hands and look down at her. I knew the feeling of unease last night wasn't all in my head. I knew that something was wrong. "You have to tell me things. When something happens to you ... it happens to me, too. We're in this together."

"I'm sorry," she says softly, her bright eyes finding mine. "I don't regret staying with Rachel while she was sick, but I wish I had been spared those long days that we waited to find out for sure. It's hell and I didn't want you to go through that, Callie. Everytime the phone rings for the next few days ... you're going to stop breathing, your heart is going to skip a few beats, and you're gonna feel relieved and let down at the same time when it's not the call we're waiting for. And I don't want to do that to you."

"I'm used to not breathing and my heart skipping a few beats, Erica. That's what you do to me around the clock. And I'll gladly take five days in hell with you because as long as I'm with you ... it doesn't matter where we are."

She starts to cry so I pull her against me, rubbing her back. My own tears wet the top of her head as I rest my cheek against it, breathing her in. It's so hard sometimes ... being a doctor. I know that hope is often futile, that prayers go unanswered, that medicine can hinder instead of heal, and that there's a truth that doctors know, but don't always share. We can't fix everything. We can try, we can fight with every ounce of skill and determination we possess, but sometimes we fail. And when we become the patient, we don't have to be told anything ... because we KNOW. Addison will try her hardest to be encouraging, but she will stop just shy of telling us that it will be okay, because we KNOW that what it could be is more terrifying than the million and one things it probably is. We stay that way until Addison comes back in and I find myself drawn to the scan as Addison preps her for the Fine Needle Aspiration ... there's nothing fine about it.

I flip the light on and gaze at the images. The mass isn't very deep and I wonder how I didn't feel it any one of the million times that I've touched her. Is it because I wasn't paying enough attention or is it because I never touched her like a doctor, but as a lover. I'm still staring at the mass, trying to wrap my head around how something smaller than a dime can weigh on me like the world when Addison reaches around me and turns the light off. She brushes the back of her hand against mine and softly says, "I'm ready to start. I'm going to let Dr. Grey assist me. If you want to stay in the room, that's fine with me."

I nod at her and walk back to the stretcher like a zombie. Erica reclines on her back as Lexie comes into the room and gives me a sympathetic look. I watch her meticulously lay out the tools Addison will need and take a deep breath when she unbuttons Erica's gown, exposing her breast. It makes it real now, it confirms that I wasn't looking at just anyone's mammogram ... I was looking at Erica's mammogram and there is something there that's not right. When Addison tells her to lift her left arm over her head, I move around to the top of the bed and hang onto her hand. She lifts her other hand and I take it as well, pressing a kiss to her forehead. I can tell by looking at her face that the numbing medication burns and when she bites her lip against the pain, I put my mouth against her ear and say, "We need to take a vacation. I don't care where we go as long as it's very, very far away. How about Hawaii?"

"That's not far enough," she replies. "How about Italy?"

"Now that's a vacation," I tell her. "I've always wanted to go to Tuscany."

"For the art?" she asks softly.

"Hell no! For the food! They invented pizza there. I'm sure it's good."

The death grip she has on my hands loosens a little as she chuckles. "So, while I'm enjoying the art you'll be -"

"Enjoying you. Like always." I kiss the side of her face and she turns her head a little so she can look at me. I'm sure that she can see how hard I'm fighting to not lose my mind. She knows me better than I know myself sometimes and I have no doubt that she's reading me like a book and seeing my fear and worry, but she doesn't comment on that. She simply looks into my eyes and I hope that she's drawing the same kind of strength from me that I take from her.

"I love you," she says, barely above a whisper. "I'm glad you're here."

"You're stuck with me."

"Thank God." She winces and I stand back up, watching as Addison makes the first of several retrievals with the needle.

It's the only one I can look at.

I don't watch the rest.

I keep my eyes on Erica's face and try to tell her without speacking that everything is going to be just fine.

It's over in a matter of minutes and I secure the bandage, listening to Addison give us a rundown of what we can expect. I've given the speech myself so I already know it by heart, but I don't stop her. I let her walk us through the possibilities and prepare us for the worst case scenario, forcing myself to keep a stiff upper lip. Neither of us have any questions for Addison and I watch her impulsively hug Erica, rubbing her arm. "No heavy lifting for a few days," she tells her. "And put an ice pack on it to reduce swelling. Callie's got my cell number if you need anything. Anything."

"Thank you." Erica gives her a smile that I know is as genuine as she can muster under the circumstances and my heart twists in my chest.

Addy gives me a hug next. "I told Richard that Erica wasn't feeling well and you'd be taking her home and staying with her. It's fine. I'll have Dr. Grey bring in a prescription for pain. And ... something to help her sleep."

"I really don't need anything," Erica says with a shake of her head. "I feel fine."

"Just in case," Addison says, smiling sweetly at her. "You can get dressed and go when you're ready."

When we're alone, I retrieve Erica's scrubs from the chair where she left them neatly folded and put them on the stretcher next to her. I unsnap her gown and ease it over her arms and ... I can't not let my fingers graze over her skin because touching her is second nature to me now. I touch the side of her breast, careful not to put any pressure. "Does it hurt?"

"No."

"Would you tell me if it did?"

"Probably not."

"You remember all those rules you were giving me about living together?" I ask, picking up her shirt. I unfold it and slide it over her head. "I have a few to add to it."

She slides her arms into the sleeves. "You're about to lay down the law, aren't you?"

"Yep. These aren't house rules, though. These are my rules." I push the sheet off her legs and stand between them, resting my hands on her thighs. "Number one, you can't keep things from me. I want to know the smallest details of your life because it's my life, too. Number two, nothing in this world is going to make me leave you so if that's why you hid this from me last night and said what you did about me leaving ... stop. It's never going to happen. I love you. So don't piss me off like this again because I can't really yell at you right now and I want to."

"What? No third rule?"

"I'm relatively easy to get along with. That's it."

"Next time ... I'll tell you right away."

I shake my head vehemently. "Rule number three, there better not be a next time! This is your one crisis, lady. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be prematurely gray now."

Joking with her, playing around and making her smile ... I don't think it makes either one of us feel any better. She knows that I'm laughing to keep from crying and I know that she's being brave for my benefit. If we weren't leaning on each other right now ... we'd both be curled in a fetal position sobbing our guts out. She could be very, very sick. She could be my Rachel, now. I could love her, pray that it's enough to heal her, and then watch her leave me after fighting a losing battle.

She could have cancer.

Erica Hahn could have cancer.

But what she most definitely has ... is me.

I'm not going anywhere and even though I'm petrified ... I'm hers.

Despite her declarations that she's not in any pain, Erica takes the medication Addison prescribed in the car. I don't know if it's because she wants to sleep and not think about the possibilities that I can't stop thinking about or if she lied to me about the pain, but whatever it is ... I don't blame her. She's yawning by the time I change her clothes and get her into bed and I stay with her until she's asleep and then I sit on the window seat and watch her until my parents get home with Jasper.

I'm happy for the diversion. I'm happy that Jasper is home and is trying to tell me that he had an accident in the car. His pants are soaked with his urine and I lead him down the hallway and dig in his suitcase for something clean. To my absolute shock, there are demin shorts inside and I pull those out, handing them to him. He hugs them to his chest and bounces into the bathroom where he waits quietly for me to come and help him. He takes his disadvantages well. When he was eight years old, he got poison oak on his groin after we went camping together. He refused to let my mother see it when I brought him home bow legged and miserable. He walked like he had been riding a horse for thirty days with no bathroom breaks and holed himself in the bathroom to wait for my father to get home. He simply could not face the humiliation of a girl seeing him naked.

Now? He has no clue. When I strip his shorts off and wipe him down with the baby wipes that my mother carries around just for his type of thing, he is absolutely unaffected by his nudity. He doesn't care that I see him nude and has no reservations about letting me pull clean underwear over his sneakers and up his legs. He's busy rubbing his thumb over his toothbrush and asking me if he can use it. If I tell him yes, I'll wind up having to change his shirt because he'll get soaked. If I tell him now, he could cry and as close as I am to falling apart ... I'd join him. I compromise and brush his teeth for him, then dry his face and rub his head. There are a couple of black marks on his scalp that I can see through his buzz cut. Derek must have shown my parents where the incision would be. Jazz sits down in the floor when his teeth are cleaned and pulls his socks and shoes off, wiggling his toes as he rubs them against the palm tree throw rug.

"No swim?" he says, pointing at the trees.

"No swim, Jazz. Not today."

He crosses his arms over his chest in petulance and scowls at me. "I swim!"

My mind races fast. Derek has a lake on his property, but I really don't want to show up with Jazz and ask if he can dive in. Jasper hates pools because the chlorine hurts his eyes and the water in Seattle is notoriously colder than what he's used to in Miami. Hell, I went in one time and that was more than enough for me. The sand doesn't compare, either. Jasper doesn't handle change well, either. But I think we could both benefit from getting out of the house. I rifle through his suitcase for his sandals and slip them on his feet, then hold my hand out. "Come on. We'll go swim."

I tell my mother that Erica is sick and to please keep an eye on her and grab a couple of towels. I roll Jasper's window down when Lake Washington comes into view and he bounces in his seat in anticipation as he points and tries to put his excitement into words. Magnuson Park is not crowded, but I find the most secluded picnic table to park in front of and take his hand as we walk down the pebbled path toward the water. I can't make Erica's results come back immediately, but I can make my brother smile and that's exactly what he does when he sits down and rolls his shorts legs up. I don't know why he always does that, but it's amusing to watch. He shucks off his sandals and rushes into the water, then rushes right back out. "Cold!"

I take off my shoes and wade out to my knees, kicking some water in his direction. "Don't you wanna swim?"

"Yes!"

"Come on."

He doesn't run this time. He takes tiny steps toward me and holds out his hand, shivering a little. "You go, Lee."

"You go!" I hold onto his hand, laughing when he shakes his head. "It will only be cold for a second. Go on."

Jazz gazes out at the water, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. When he looks my way again, he says, "This is not home."

For my brother to speak in a whole sentence is something so rare that I have to stop and let his words wash over me. He's right. This is not home. This is as far from home as he can get, really. It was my decision to move that far, to take a job on the other side of the country ... to get away from him. I lace his large fingers with mine and smile at him. "Home is where the heart is, buddy. We'll dive together. Wanna?"

"Dive!" He gestures at the water, then bounces a little. "Go under!"

"Ready?" I ask him, pulling him a little further out with me. "On three."

"Three!" Jazz yells, letting go of my hand and diving. He cuts the water like a knife, sailing into it with all the grace of an olympic swimmer. When he comes up, he's gasping for air and hugging himself. He takes one look at my dry hair and clothes and wags a finger at me. I screech when he picks me up and throws me. The water is freezing and it pricks at my skin like a thousand tiny needles when I splash into it. I feel him move against me and push me upward and we stand laughing in chest deep water. He looks out toward the horizon and says, "Where waves?"

"This is a lake," I tell him. "No waves."

"Hmm." He puts his arms straight out and fans them in the water, causing small ripples. "S'okay now."

He's making waves for me and I splash him in the face, causing him to laugh so boisterously that I notice a couple of people on rafts look our way. I don't care. I dive under the water and grab his legs and when I come up for air, he grips me around the waist and dunks me. We horseplay for hours. We splash until I'm exhausted and then I float carelessly on my back while Jazz swims in circles around me like a shark. I feel like there are real sharks circling me. Jazz could have the surgery and die. Erica could have cancer and die. And I'd be left bleeding out while I pray for sharks to take mercy on me and kill me once and for all. I wouldn't be able to live without either one of them. I wouldn't want to.

No ... it's not about wanting to.

I physically could not live without them.

It would be like asking me to live without air, without a heart.

"Lee!" Jazz yells, suddenly, and his tone startles me senseless."UP!"

I splash in the water and go under for a second, then come back up fast. The jet-ski that is bearing down on me notices my splashing and changes course, barely missing me by a few inches. I swallow plenty of water and strangle, fighting to breathe. I'm grateful to the strong arms that wrap around me because it means I don't have to try to breathe and swim at the same time since I'm failing at both. When I'm in waist deep water, the arms let me go and I pull in rasping gulps of air ... looking up to thank my savior.

Only Jazz is there. He pats me on the head and says, "I got you."

I wring water out of my tank top and stare at him in shock. Once again ... I've underestimated my brother. He just saved me. The jet-ski probably wouldn't have killed me, but it would have hurt like a bitch. He was watching me the whole time. Sometimes it amazes me ... what he sees. When he takes my arm and pulls me to the small patch of sand that is technically more grass than sand, I happily flop down and he sits beside me, close enough that our legs touch. "Thanks, Jazz."

"Be careful. Pay 'tention."

He's right.

I should pay attention.

I didn't feel the lump in Erica's breast because I'm always eager to bypass the bases and go straight for the homerun.

I didn't pay attention to the voice in my head that knew I was meant to be with Erica and wasted a ton of our time living with Mark and denying what I felt.

And Jasper could die. I read the mortality rates, but I didn't pay attention because I refused to believe it could happen to him.

I go through life with my eyes half shut and it causes me to miss too much.

"Jasper," I say softly. "Do you want to have surgery? Do you want them to fix your brain?"

"Derek fix my brain," he replies, touching the exact spot on his head where the black line Derek drew there is fading. "He rub my brain. Like this."

I watch my brother massage his head and nod at him. "Derek wants to operate on you. It will hurt."

Jazz nods. "Band Aid?"

"Yeah, you'll get a Band Aid."

He takes a deep breath. "I not cry."

"You won't?"

"No scared." He massages his head again. "Derek nice."

My heart is hammering in my chest as he pulls his legs up and leans his head against his knees. I watch him close his eyes and it's so easy to see the little boy there. He's the same Jasper who blew up balloons for my high school graduation and stuck them on the walls outside my bedroom door. He brought me ice cream in bed after my appendix ruptured and then stayed with me, sleeping on a pallet in the floor, so he could hear me if I needed help. When I stumbled at three a.m. and popped a stitch, he made me get back in the bed before he'd go and get our mother. And he sat beside me in the car on the way back to the hospital after pitching a tantrum at the thought of being left behind for one second. I was his and he was mine. The ten year gap in our ages never mattered. For all intents and purposes ... he was my first best friend and I was his.

"Erica could have cancer," I tell him and I hear my voice tremble a little over the world. "She could die."

His eyes open, but his head stays down. He rolls it to one side and looks at me. "She not die."

"She could." A tear rolls down my cheek and I wipe it away. I don't want to scare him. "I don't know what to do."

Jasper lifts his head and takes my hand, kissing the back of it. He points up at the sky and says, "Look, Lee."

I glance up at nothing except the fluffy white clouds drifting lazily through the cerulean sky. "What?"

"God has us." He squeezes my hand, still gazing upward. "Be okay. See?"

The rainbow seems to appear from nowhere. The yellow bleeds into the red and the red to green and my breath catches in my throat as it seems to get bigger still. The display of color is so ferocious that the water picks it up and refects it back, casting off prisms or hope that dry my tears. I glance down at the ring that Erica put on my figner and it shines beautifully, the yellow diamonds sparkling with clarity that it unmistakable. If I wasn't experiencing it myself ... I'd never believe it in a million years. I've asked for signs before. I've prayed for answers about a surgery or for God to be with me when I cut someone open, but this is something else altogether. If the water in front of us parted ... I wouldn't be remotely shocked.

The colors hang around until our clothes are dry and our teeth stop chattering.

I can still see it in my rearview mirror when I drive away from the lake. It's brighter than the setting sun could ever be.

It convinces me that Jasper is right and that God wants nothing more than for us all to 'be okay'.

And we will.

Erica is still sleeping when I get home. I leave Jasper to my mother's care and take a shower before I climb into bed naked. The house is far too cold and I curl against her, shivering. She mumbles something about me feeling like ice, but wraps her arms around me anyway. I drift off to sleep and when I wake up, she's rubbing my hair out of my eyes. "Cal?"

"Sleeping," I murmur and try to roll over to no avail. The pain in my arms hits me full throttle and I groan.

"Jesus Christ!" Erica cries, pulling the cover back.

Cold air hits my body and I cringe, crying out at the change of temperature. "Stop it!"

"What did you do!?" she demands. "You have blisters."

"Huh?"

"Oh my God!" she says, peeling the cover all the way to my feet. "Did you go in the sun? You're taking Isopropamide for your stomach, Callie. You are not supposed to be in the sun without sunblock!"

"Oops."

"Oops? Shit!"

Her hands are gentle on my shoulder, but not so gentle that the pain isn't horrific. "Ow!"

"I'll be right back," she says, covering me up once again.

I dance toward sleep, but then she's back and pulling the cover off me again and it's infuriating. I struggle to hang onto it because my entire body feels like it's drenched in ice, but she gets me on my feet and walks with me into the bathroom. The nausea hits with the harsh lights in the bathroom and she hangs onto me as I heave over the toilet. Nothing comes out and it causes a headache that feels like a hangover to start pounding in my head. When the nausea eventually passes, Erica gives me a cup of water and I rinse, then let her ease me into the bathtub that she has filled with room temperature water. Before I can recline, she deftly twists my hair and secures it on top of my head, then she eases me back into the water. I'm still frozen and I'm tempted to sit up and turn the hot water on, but I don't. Instead, I doze while she makes a phone call.

When she hangs up and drips water over my shoulders, I hiss and I say, "Is Jazz okay?"

"He's a lot better than you right now. He's got a mild sunburn, but he's not complaining at all."

"I'm not complaining either."

"You will."

"What does that mean?"

She shrugs, ignoring my question. "Do you think you can keep some water down? You need to take Aleve."

I nod at her and she hands me a bottle of water and two pills. "Erica?"

"Yeah?"

"I saw a rainbow today that was so big it nearly took up the sky. I think it means everything is going to be fine."

She makes a face at me. "You are anything but fine. These burns ... Callie, what were you thinking?"

"I was thinking that my brother wanted to go swimming." I take the pills and chase them with a sip of water. "He had fun."

"I know, he told me all about it. He said you nearly drowned."

"That was less fun." I let my eyes move over her face. She looks rested, beautiful. Her hair has been smoothed back into a pony tail and her face is scrubbed free of makeup. She doesn't look like someone who found a lump in their breast. She looks far too peaceful for that. "I'm supposed to be taking care of you. Not the other way around."

"Well, I'm not the jackass who stayed in the sun for five hours during the worst hours of the day for sun exposure now am I?"

"We were there for five hours? God, time flew."

She lifts the wash cloth, squeezing water over my shoulders once more. When she wets it again, she blots at my face. "I had a really nice dream while I was sleeping."

"You did?" I ask, yawning a little. "Tell me about it."

"We were in Italy and you were wearing this yellow dress that was so gorgeous I couldn't stop looking at you. Every picture I've ever seen of Tuscany ... that's what it was, but I only saw you. And you were smiling and laughing and trying to speak broken Italian. I didn't want to wake up at all. It was amazing."

"We should go," I tell her, smiling. "Let's just do it."

"We will," she replies, taking my hand in hers. "Soak for a few minutes. I'll be right back."

I think about Italy while she's gone. Webber will give us the time off without question. I've got quite a bit of vacation and personal time saved up and I'm sure that Erica cut quite the deal with her compensation package when she signed onto Seattle Grace. We could spend a couple of weeks forgetting everything and everyone and just be. I'm going to make a few calls and see what I can do. I glance up when she walks back into the room. She's carrying a spaghetti strap gown that I haven't worn in years. It's pale blue with little irises all over it. I can't remember who bought it for me, but I didn't do it. It's like a little girl's gown and I wrinkle my nose when I see it. "I'd rather be naked."

"Trust me, I don't think so." She pulls the stopper and holds her hands out to me. "Come on, you."

I don't let her help me. She shouldn't be doing any straining and while it nearly kills me to push myself upright on my own, I manage. She slowly blots me dry and fills her hand with aloe vera, gently patting it over my skin. By the time she pulls my gown into place, I completely understand the severity of the situation. The pain is a strong indicator, but I get a glimpse of myself in the mirror and draw up short. I've never really sunburned. Never. My skin usually tans and I seldom, if ever, peel. Right now, however, I'm tomato red and the tops of my shoulders have large, water filled blisters on them. My cheeks are leathery, purplish with rash and my nose is crimson. I gasp and reach up to touch my face, but Erica won't let me. "I'm hideous!"

"You're not hideous. You're stupid, idiotic, and discolored ... but you could never be hideous."

"Thanks," I tell her, still examining my reflection. I study the gown and wrinkle my nose as much as it will wrinkle with the swelling. "And I look like Laura Ingalls."

"I'll give you that much." She takes my hand and leads me back to our bedroom. Instead of putting me under the cover, though, she tells me to sit on the bench that we made love on. It's freezing in our room and I whine until she turns the ceiling fan off.

When my mother comes into the room and freaks out, I'm grateful that it takes my mind off the pain and how cold I am. My teeth are chattering as Erica rifles through the closet and eventually brings out a small space heater. She plugs it into the wall and points it at me, then kneels down beside me, explaining to my mother what a phototoxic reaction is. My mother hears the word toxic and wants to call 911, but Erica tells her that Mark Sloan is on the way to our house to judge for himself what I need. I want to protest, I want to put my foot down and make it clear that I don't need any house calls, specifically from Mark, but Erica shoots me a look that makes me keep my thoughts to myself. When I hear a car pull into the driveway and two doors slam, I cringe, but say nothing.

My father, who hasn't seen the sun damage, leads Mark and Addison into our room. My father loses it when he sees the state I'm in. Addison puts her arm around him and tells him it's okay as Mark puts his black medical bag on the foot of the bed and lifts my chin. "What medication is she on?" he asks Erica, rubbing his thumb over my nose.

She rambles off the new stomach medications that I was prescribed a few weeks ago, adding that I'm also taking sinus medication. Mark lifts my arm and studies the blisters on my shoulder. "How long were you exposed?"

"Hours," I tell him.

"Why?" he asks, glancing at my back. "You didn't wear any sunblock at all?"

"It was a spur of the moment thing."

He shakes his head and pulls out a blood pressure cuff. It hurts when it squeezes my burned flesh, but I don't say a word. I do protest when he pulls out two bags of saline and the IV kit. His face is set when he says, "I can treat you here or take you to the hospital and Bailey has been on duty for twenty hours. Do you really want to hear what she would say about this?"

"No." I sigh and hold out my arm.

He kneels down to start the IV, but Erica takes it instead. "Her veins suck. I'll do it."

Nodding, he turns back to his and rifles through. "Addison, would you get the rest of the equipment out of the car?"

Erica gets my vein on the first try and flushes it. My father goes with Addison and they return wheeling an IV cart that Mark hooks the saline up to. "Webber is going to kick your ass," I tell him as he hands tape to Erica. "Did you steal this stuff from the clinic? Because Bailey will kill what's left of you when he's finished."

He grins at me. "You let me worry about that. Have you had any nausea? Headache?"

"Yes to both."

"Did you vomit?"

"Dry heaves," I tell him. "I haven't eaten today."

"Oh, lovely," he replies. "It's nice to know that you take such excellent care of yourself without m ... er ... have you felt dizzy at all? Lightheaded?."

"No," I say, narrowing my eyes a little. He was about to imply that Erica can't take care of me the way that he did. If he had gone there ... I'd shove his scalpel up his ass. "I feel like I have the flu, that's it."

Addison hands him the thermometer and he sticks it in my ear, then shakes his head when it beeps. "One oh two point five."

"We should take her to the hospital," Addy says, looking sympathetic. "It's bad."

"No," I tell her, shaking my head. "I'm fine."

"You're not fine, honey," my dad says, "Go to the hospital. Mark, should she go?"

"I don't think so, Santos," Mark replies. "I'm going to treat her exactly how I'd do it there. She'll be more comfortable here."

The treatment is a bag of antibiotics to stave off infection from the blisters, steroids, and pain medication that does make me lightheaded. I ask for something to drink and my parents both leave to retrieve something. While Erica slowly injects anti-nausea medication, Mark says, "I'll wrap her arms, but you need to keep changing them as the blisters start to weep."

"Okay," she replies. "Thanks for coming, Sloan."

"You're welcome, Hahn." He nods at her, reaching into his bag to retrieve the gauze. "And ... I really hope that your results ... are fine. I ... hope that you're okay."

Erica glances at me, then at Addison. "Does everyone know?"

"No." Addy shakes her head. "I sort of had a breakdown when I went out to order your mammogram and he found me. I told him to get Callie for me and he did."

"You had a breakdown?" I ask, shocked. "Why?"

Addison's blue eyes find mine. "Because you're my best friend, Callie, and you're happier than you have ever been. I knew that I was about to steal that happiness and make you miserable." She reaches out and puts her hand on Erica's shoulder. "I'm rooting for you, Erica. With everything that I have in me ... I'm rooting for this to be nothing and for you to be just fine. I hope that you will be because ... Callie deserves to be happy and the two of you deserve time. A lot of happy, happy time. I'm a little bit tipsy, I think."

"That's okay and thank you," Erica tells her, patting the hand on her shoulder. "I'll be fine. I've never had such a big reason to live before."

I notice that Mark is watching her intently and when she looks up at him, he nods his head just a little. It's his way of conceding defeat, I think. It's him making peace with the person I left him for and accepting that she won. It's his own way of saying that the war can stop now, that the name calling and cruel insults can end because he's gotten past it. He can stand in our bedroom and put his bag on the bed where we make love without commenting on it or wanting to break it with his bare hands. Mark Sloan ... is finally bowing out gracefully and coming here tonight when she called him ... that's his peace offering. When Erica starts to stand, he holds his hand out to her and she takes it, letting him help her to her feet. It's as good as a handshake, I think. He hangs onto her even after she's on her feet.

"Thank you for coming. I appreciate it," she tells him and I can hear the sincerity in her voice. "Mark."

"Thank you for calling me. I wasn't on duty and I wouldn't be comfortable with anyone else checking her out. Erica." The smile he gives her is not his patented McSteamy smile. It's just a small, sad, tugging at one corner of his lip and for some reason, that breaks my heart. "So, truce?"

"Truce." She grins at him, a brilliant, beaming grin that takes my breath away.

I don't know if it's the pain or the medication or something else entirely different, but I burst into tears and that prompts my mother to join me when she rushes back into the room carrying a glass of lemonade. Addison puts an arm around her as Erica hugs me, whispering that everything will be okay. She helps Mark bandage my arms and turns the cover down for me, fluffing my pillow. Jasper comes in as she tucks the comforter around me and announces that he's hungry. He stops thinking of his belly when he sees me and he shakes his head back and forth. "Lee! Wrong?"

"She's okay, buddy," Erica tells him, motioning for him to join us.

Jasper trudges to the side of the bed and looks at my purple/red face. "Lee, sick?"

"I'm okay, Jazz."

His chin trembles and his brown eyes fill with tears. He does have a sunburn and I'm about to comment on it when he kneels beside the bed and clasps his hands under his chin. "Dear God, Lee get better now. Bless everybody. And Yellow no die, too. Amen."

We all echo 'Amen' because he looks at us expectantly. When Erica invites Addison and Mark to stay for dinner, telling them that my mother has cooked enough lasagne for a small army, they accept right away. Jasper climbs into bed beside me, being careful not to jar the bed and announces that he's staying there. No one tells him otherwise. I fall asleep with my head on his shoulder as he pats my hand and says, "There, there" like a broken record.

He remembered what I told him about Erica dying.

And he included her in his prayers.

There is no way God didn't listen to that.

When I wake up, my mother is fluttering around the room picking up laundry and raising the blinds. I'm shocked to see that the sun is out and the second I sit up ... I regret it. The blisters on my shoulders and upper arms howl in protest and I fall back against the pillows, rumbling a terse greeting. My mom puts the articles of clothing she has amassed into the hamper and rests a hand on my forehead, muttering about checking for fever. I take the bottle of water she holds out and drain half of it before I ask where Erica is. Much to my shock and aggravation, she's at work. My mother sees the look on my face and says, "Relax, honey. She got called in for a consult, but she said she'd be back before lunch."

"What time is it?"

"Just after eight. You did a number on your brother yesterday. He was so wound up when he got home and was so excited to see Mark and Addison that I couldn't get him to go to sleep until after one." She sits down on the edge of the bed and holds out a couple of pills. "Erica made it very clear that you needed to take these first thing."

I do as I'm instructed and settle back against the pillows again. "How was dinner?"

"It was lovely. I'm sorry you slept through it. The highlight was your brother telling us that a jet-ski nearly decapitated you."

"He said 'decapitated'?"

"Well, no, but I've learned how to get the gist of what he's saying. Call it a mother's intuition." She reaches out and takes my hand. "Just like I know when you've got something on your mind. What's wrong, Callie?"

I sigh, rubbing a hand over my face which is the wrong thing to do. My skin feels like leather and it causes me to hiss in pain. "Do I look as bad as I feel?"

"Do you feel like death warmed over? If the answer is yes ... then yes."

"Thanks, Mom."

"Did you have a fight with Erica?"

"What? No." I sigh and push myself up again. It's nearly impossible to have hard conversations when you're lying flat on your back and feeling miserable. "Are you disappointed about that?"

"The way you blew out of her with Jasper yesterday ... I thought you were mad."

"I was mad. Just not at her. Mom ..."

"Is it the people who wrote that word on your garage?" My mother pulls my head against her shoulder when I start to cry. She's careful with me, avoiding the blisters and bandages on my upper body and settling her hands on my waist instead. She pats my lower back and says, "I know it's scary, angel. Have you prayed?"

"A lot."

"So have a little faith."

"I have a lot of faith." I sniffle and ease back, studying her face. "You don't believe that, do you? You think I turned my back on God."

"If you want to have a life that the Bible speaks against then that's your path to take and you will have to answer to God for it. Not me. I guess I can be peaceful with that because a part of me still thinks that you're going to wake up and realize that you could have more with a man. I like Erica. I do. I think she's great, but I'm your mother and I don't want to drive up to your house and see graffitti on your walls or hear about animals being slaughtered on your porch."

"She's worth all of that. I know that you don't understand, but there is nothing that a man could give me that she can't." I watch her open her mouth to reply, but I cut her off. "Mom, if you're going to say that we can't have kids, you're wrong. We can and we're going to. What if I was married and my husband had a problem? It's the same thing. We're going to use a sperm donor and have a family. A life. We already do. And yeah, it sucks that someone is taking offense to that and mangling our property, but that's not going to make me change my mind."

My mother looks like she swallowed something that tastes very bitter. "If you have a child ... which one of you will assume the role of mother. I mean, you let her do the cooking and she's always picking up the place so she's ... motherly. You're just ... not fatherly."

Really, she couldn't have said anything more infuriating. "We've covered this already, but I'll tell you again. One of us doesn't have to be masculine and neither of us are. She isn't taking over the role of the 'wife' any more than I'm trying to be the 'husband'. We're two women who both enjoy being women. I don't want to be a guy. She doesn't want to be a guy."

"Then why isn't she just your 'friend'? The same way that Addison is?"

"Why are we having this conversation, Mother!? You have been around us long enough to see that she is nothing like Addison to me. I don't want to be with Addison. The difference is ... I was able to live without Addison just fine. She went off to California for months and I rarely spoke to her. If I go two hours without hearing Erica's voice ... I start to go a little crazy. Erica is definitely a friend to me. She's an amazing friend, but she's also my lover and the person that I want to spend the rest of my life with."

"And sex with her -"

"MOM!" I shove the cover back and get to my feet. My heart is hammering, my blood pressure is rising, and I feel like pulling my hair out. "I don't have sex with her! I have had sex with a lot of guys. Well, not really, but by your standards it would be a lot and that's all it ever was. I had sex. I don't have sex with Erica. I make love with her. I never knew there was a distinction until she showed me the difference. And that's not the most important part of us, but it's amazing. If you're not going to support me and my decisions then don't pretend that you do. It's insulting!"

"I just want to understand!"

"Understand this!" I yell. There's no turning back for me now. "Erica had a biopsy yesterday! She has lump in her breast and we don't know what it is yet! She could have cancer! So all you need to understand is that I'm finally living the fairy tale I always wanted and she could die. Maybe that's what you want!"

"No! No, Callie, I'd never-"

"Whatever!" I storm into the bathroom and slam the door.

The irony of it all is not lost on me. My mother locked herself in her bathroom when she found out that Erica and I were together. Then she kicked me out of her house. Now I'm locked in the bathroom and she's pounding on the door begging me to let her in and I want nothing more than to kick her out of my house, but I can't. I won't do that. When you get into a cycle and press repeat ... it's hard to stop. So, I don't say or do anything except sit down on the toilet and try not to hyperventilate. My breath is coming so fast that I know I'm close to breaking apart completely and when I finally do ... it's bad.

I'd just like to say that I'm not some wilting flower who buckles under pressure. I'm just ... not. I'm strong and I know that I'm not made of glass, but sometimes even a brick building can cave in on itself if you rattle its foundation enough. It's a culmination of a million and one things hitting me full force that causes me to give in and just cry. I'm in pain, obviously, and my body feels like I've been deep fried in million degree oil, but that's minor. I really, truly, genuinely from the bottom of my heart ... believed that my mother had come around. I really thought that watching me interact with Erica and seeing how happy she makes me would have been enough to convince her once and for all that I've made the right decision. How could ANYONE not see it? It's undeniable. It's there. She's the other part of me that I need to be ... whole. I floundered until I finally found her and now ... even my own mother can't believe in me enough to trust me.

This couldn't hurt worse if I walked outside and found my mom spray painting 'Dyke' on the side of the house. It just couldn't.

"Callie, open the door."

That's my dad.

"Mija," he continues. "Come on out now. You're hurt and you don't need to ... whatever your mother said to upset you ... she WILL apologize. Hush, Lori Anne! Callie, if you don't let me in then I'm going to break a window. You don't want that."

He's using the voice that he usually reserves for my mother after she's had a temper tantrum. It's gentle and coaxing, the kind of mediator voice that would calm a celebrity Diva who didn't get the green M&Ms she wanted in her dressing room. It shouldn't strike me as condescending, but I feel so patronized that I flush the toilet to drown out his voice and tell him to leave me alone.

If there was a magic button I could press to stop the tears ... I'd gladly hit it right now.

But that doesn't exist.

So, I sit there until I'm all cried out.

And wait for Erica to come home.

"Baby?"

I'm sitting in the floor in front of the bathtub, my head leaning back against it dozing a little, when I hear her. She wiggles the doorknob and I can hear my mother's voice as I push myself to my feet. I feel one of the blisters on my shoulder pop and spew wetness under the bandages and wrinkle my nose. That's just the topping to go with my very rancid cake. I pull the door open and glare at my mother, but before I can say anything, Erica's hand is on my stomach and she's pushing me back into the bathroom and shutting the door behind us. Instead of demanding answers, she hugs me and gives me a kiss.

"She is sooooo horrible," I cry, tears blurring my eyes again. "She acts like she gets us and then she doesn't and then she -"

"She's your mother," Erica tells me, dabbing at my face with a tissue. "She would stop being your mother if she didn't push for what she thinks is best for you. If we have a kid who chooses to grow up and start dating Stevens then ... well, all hell will break loose."

I have to laugh at that. "Yeah, well you could be Jack the Ripper and still not be as bad as Stevens."

She presses her hand to my forehead. "Did you take your medicine?"

"Yes and can you please focus on the fact that I'm having a breakdown here?" I take the tissue from her and blow my nose, then toss it into the toilet. "Are you okay? How do you feel? Does it hurt? Can I -"

"We're focusing on you," she tells me. "Now, what did Lori Anne say that was so bad?"

"She said I'm not fatherly!"

"Well, that's actually true, sweetheart. You're not."

"She said it in a way that means that we can't both be mothers! And then she said that you're not different than Addison and you clearly are because I've never wanted to have sex with Addison so I explained that you don't have sex with me ... what you do to me is so much more than that and ... you have something in your breast that could kill you and I swear to GOD if you leave me I'm following right behind you and I'm bringing you back! I'll fight God, Jesus, and the apostles until they let you go! Moses, too. Anyone who would let bats on the arc needs his ass handed to him. Shit, this room is spinning."

"How much medicine did you take?"

"I dunno. It's lack of food that's doing it."

"You haven't eaten!? I let you skip dinner because you were exhausted!" She takes my hand and reaches for the bathroom door, but I stop her. "Cal-"

"I don't want to go another round with her. I can't."

She gives me a kiss when I start to cry again. "I'm here. It'll be okay."

"You don't know my mother."

"Your mother doesn't know me." She opens the door and my heart starts to pound. This could potentially be very, very ugly.

My mom, who is sitting on our bed, leaps to her feet. "Are you okay? Callie? Your father was about to take the hinges off the door."

Erica takes a deep breath. "This isn't a good time. She's hungry and doesn't feel well. So, you can talk about this later. Right now, we're going to eat some lunch."

My mother blinks a couple of times, then tries to look impressive by pulling herself up to her full height. Instead of biting Erica, she ignores her. "I waited my entire life to have a daughter and this isn't the life I wanted for you. You're in harm's way because of people who don't approve of your lifestyle. And I do want you to be happy and if Erica makes you happy then I'm grateful to her for that ... but it doesn't make me feel any better. If your happiness depended on you being a racecar driver ... I'd still break your legs to keep you out of the driver's seat."

Erica takes a deep breath. "Lori Anne, I really don't want to hurt your feelings or make you feel bad, but this is our house and I will not watch Callie lock herself behind a damn door to get away from anyone ... even you. We are going to the kitchen, where you will not be, and she's going to eat in peace. If she wants to talk to you after that ... she'll let you know."

I expect my mother to stomp her dainty size six against the ground and scream at her, but she doesn't. What she does is nod and turn around, walking out of our bedroom. My mouth falls open so far that it quickly dries out. It's still hanging open when Erica pulls me into the kitchen and pulls out a chair for me. The house is eerily quiet and I glance outside. My dad is in the backyard throwing a ball for Buddha and Jasper is lying on his stomach as he enjoys his dog's antics. Erica puts a cold Sprite in front of me and hands me another dosage of medication, watching me take it. I'm impressed by how calm she is. When she puts a sandwich in front of me and sits beside me, I reach over and take her hand. "I love you."

She grins at me, lifting my hand and kissing the back of it. "I love you right back."

My eyes well with tears again and I hate that I'm this weak when I should be holding her up through the wait for her biopsy results. I've never been so weak in my life and it's her fault that I've become someone who needs someone else so much. "Promise me something?"

"Anything," she replies.

"If you have to go through chemotherapy ... promise me that you will fight with everything you have. Promise me ... if it gets bad ... you'll let me carry you through it and never push me away."

Her chin moves just a fraction, but she stops it before it can quiver. "I promise."

"And if it does get so bad that you have to give up ..."

"Callie-"

"If you can't beat it ... don't you dare tell me to find someone else and move on because I won't. The rest of my life is yours ... whether you're here to live it with me or not. It's yours. And I'll just be biding my time until someone upstairs takes pity on me and lets me sleep beside you again." I reach over and cup her cheek, brushing away the tear that falls. "Even if you break my heart by leaving me ... remembering this right here ... will hold it together."

"I won't have to fight too hard. My will to live with you is stronger than the best chemotherapy they can give me. As long as your heart is beating ... mine will be, too." She pushes my plate toward me. "Now eat this before I kick your ass."

"Promises, promises."

She winks at me, sniffling. "Guess what I did today?"

I take a bite of my sandwich. "What?"

"I booked a cottage in Italy for three weeks. We leave in less than a month. Richard approved it and we're all set."

"OH MY GOD!" I come very close to choking on the sandwich and quickly wash it down with Sprite. "But ... what if Mom agrees to let Jazz have the operation? I can't miss that."

"It will take at least twelve weeks to get approval for the trial. You know it involves special funding and Jasper will need to be approved by a second neurologist. We'll be back in time." She tucks a strand of my hair behind my ear. "I wanted to do it soon ... just in case I do have to start chemo. I'd rather not be sick when we go."

I swallow the mouth full of food and nod at her. "So, we're going to Italy."

"We are. Three weeks of pure, unadulterated bliss."

"You give me that no matter where we are."

She leans over and kisses me. Her eyes wander over my burned face like it's still the prettiest thing she's ever seen. "Has your mother said anything about whether or not she's going to agree to the surgery?"

"Not yet." I take another bite of my sandwich and chew slowly, my mind racing. "You know what kills me? She spends so much time worrying about my life that she doesn't see how limited his is. She said she would break my legs to keep me out of a race car, but she's keeping his back broken to prevent him from healing. That's a worse sin than anything I've ever done. She's crippling someone on purpose."

"You're right."

I glance toward the arched doorway, where my mother has suddenly appeared. She's got tears streaming down her cheeks at an alarming rate and I say, "Mom -"

"Your father and I are signing the consent forms for Jasper's surgery. It's moving forward."

I don't feel the rush of elation I expected to have.

I'm suddenly scared shitless.


	20. Chapter 20

Jasper is going to have surgery.

It doesn't really, truly sink in until Derek shows up for dinner and my parents sign all the paperwork after dessert. As much as I pushed and fought for the surgery ... I'm tempted to reach across the table and rip the papers to shreds. Now it's real. Derek Shepherd will shave my brother completely bald and cut him from ear to ear, then front to back. He will peel the four folds down like a banana and expose Jasper's cranium, then he will take a saw and literally cut the top of his head off. That piece of bone will be submerged in a sterile wash until it's ready to be reattached and while my brother is in pieces ... Derek will slowly inject the transmitters into place. If Jasper doesn't have a stroke and die on the operating table it will be a miracle. And if there is no infection, no paralysis, no blindness or seizures ... that will also be a miracle. And if there are no miracles and my baby brother dies ... it was my idea. I fought everyone to make this happen. I yelled at Erica, I put a guilt trip on my mother, and if Jazz dies ... I'll never be able to wash his blood off my hands. He will stain me for an eternity and I'll regret it for the rest of my life.

Derek promised Mark that he would take a look at the blisters on my shoulders. Erica peels the bandages off in our bedroom so he can see the damage for himself and I listen to them make small talk and try to laugh in all the right places, but my heart isn't in it. I think Derek knows, because he assures me that he's going to take care of Jasper and do everything in his power to bring him back to me, I have to struggle not to cry. I've already got the world's best brother and that should have been enough for me, but it wasn't. Maybe God is making Erica sick because I keep pushing for more, more, more instead of being happy with what IS. I manage to thank Derek and sound sincere before I ask that the bandages be left off so that I can take a bath.

I run the tub full and submerge myself while Erica says goodnight to Derek and when she comes back in and looks down at me ... she knows that I'm falling apart. She doesn't have to ask me if I need an anchor. She simply takes her clothes off and joins me, sitting behind me so I can lean against her. Her long legs give me plenty of distraction and I'm content to rub her soft skin as she tells me that Jazz is in good hands and if he has to have the surgery, she's confident that Derek is the best man for the job. Her arms around my waist act as a buffer and slowly chase away the nagging thoughts. I ask her to tell me about the place she found in Italy and the picture she paints of it has me longing to be there right now, prowling through the olive groves and vineyards that surround the one bedroom stone cottage. We bathe because our skin is pruning and the water chills, not because we have any desire to leave the tub. In the bedroom, she smoothes fresh bandages over my shoulder and seals the tape with a kiss. Even though I'm sore all over ... I seduce her and that is enough to make me forget everything and fall into a peaceful sleep with one leg thrown over hers.

I don't even care that I haven't really spoken to my mother since she blasted me.

Pop Tarts.

That's what wakes me up. I sit up in bed and glance out the window, shocked to see that the sun hasn't risen yet. Erica's not in the bed with me and I slip my robe on, heading into the kitchen to locate her ... and the source of the delicious, strawberry goodness. I find her sitting at the island eating my favorite food and lean over her, taking a bite of it. "You are eating this?" I ask. "Are pigs flying outside? Did the cows come home?"

She grins at me and gives me a kiss. "I'm hungry and I didn't think your parents would appreciate me banging pots and pans around at five in the morning." She takes a bite and shrugs. "It's not that bad, really. I can feel my teeth rotting as I chew, but it's not disgusting."

Her hair is in a ponytail and she's wearing a white shirt over a tank top and yoga pants. It shocks me sometimes ... how young she can look. How much she makes me like white cotton. I usually prefer her in blue, but the white does things to me. Serious things. Dirty things. "You didn't get called in ... did you?"

"No, I'm taking a few personal days. I - I can't concentrate at work right now. I explained to Richard about the biopsy yesterday and he agreed that I needed to be here. With you. How are you feeling?"

"I'm perfectly fine," I reply, which isn't the total truth, but it's not a complete lie. My skin feels like it's drawn too tightly over my bones, but that takes a backseat to how much my insides are hurting for her. I can completely understand now why she wanted to spare me the wait for the results. The agony is endless. "How are you feeling?"

"Great," she tells me, flipping a page in a magazine, but she's not reading it. It's upside down. "What you said to me yesterday ... about your life being mine ... that was kinda beautiful."

"Kinda? Damn. I was aiming for breathtakingly beautiful."

"Well, you don't have to say anything to be that." Her eyes lock on mine and she puts the pastry down on the plate. "Callie?"

"Hmm?"

"I'm not going to let this beat me. I swear to God ... I'm not."

I'm not a crier. I'm really, truly not, but she can break me in an instant. I cry with her, because of her, for her and sometimes just thinking about her. That's the kind of power she has over me. She makes me become someone that I never thought I'd be. I feel more with her than I've ever felt. All my senses are on ten all the time and it should be exhausting, but it never is. It makes me feel alive. I'm awake because of her and I know what my heart is capable of with her. I know what I am capable of and live every second with a different perspective because I see things through her eyes, too. I sit down on the stool next to hers and take her hand in mine as the tears start to fall. I don't want to cry because she looks like she wants to and I should be strong enough for the both of us, but my tears clumsily dance over my face as I fumble for the right words. "It - it will be okay."

"I'm scared," she admits and that's enough to kill me. Erica Hahn is brave as hell. She doesn't do fear. Fear runs from her. I think sometimes when I watch her walk with her back ramrod straight that God must have given her two spines. She's STRONG and nothing breaks her back. Nothing would dare. "I don't want to have cancer. I don't want to be sick. I don't want to be poked and prodded and wake up every day with a little more hair on my pillow. It's only hair, but it's proof that you can lose. It's an every day reminder that you can lose the fight. That the war is taking something from you. I don't want to do this, Callie. I don't want to die."

I reach up and touch a curl that is lying on her forehead. I've clocked hours and hours running my fingers through her hair and I'm pretty attached to it, but it's a small price to pay to keep her here. Hell, I'd shave it right now if I thought it would save her life. "You won't."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm positive. I've got you," I tell her, the same way Jasper said it to me the day before. I cradle her face in my hands and kiss her forehead, then her mouth. "I'll take care of you."

"I don't want you to have to. I-I just hate this." Her voice, usually so full of bass and gravel, sounds like a little girl's. "I'm selfish. I know what it will be like for you. I know that you'll hold my hand every step of the way and I should tell you no. I should tell you to leave so you don't have to suffer or -"

"Shut up." I shake my head. "Let me tell you something, Hahn, you wanted me to move in here so badly that you fought with me about it ALL THE TIME. Well, here I am. You got me. And the only thing that's going to make me leave is if you eat all the damn Pop Tarts because I can't forgive that. I just ... I can't."

She sniffles and smiles at me. "Well, I'm never getting rid of you then. I don't like them that much."

"So, it's settled." I trail my thumb over her face. It's soft. Most of my life ... I've been attracted to rugged, manly men. George was something altogether different and I'd beg him to not shave, but after he finally caved and I saw the uneven growth on his face I bought him fresh razors and told him to have at it. Erica is not rugged or manly. She's so soft that I'm afraid I'll break her sometimes. She's not who I pictured myself spending forever with. It's like someone changed the movie that I was watching while I was buying popcorn and when I sat down and saw her on the screen ... I was too engrossed to figure out what the hell happened. You don't pick who you love. Who you love picks you and if you're lucky enough to get something in return ... the shock of it all is worth it. If she does have cancer ... it's just a curve in our road. Our love doesn't have cancer ... it won't have to die. "You're stuck with me so don't piss me off. We haven't had a fight in a while and I'd like to keep it that way."

"I really do love you."

"I know. That's why I'm not worried, Erica. You'd never hurt me so you're not going anywhere either."

When she kisses me, there's a desperation in her touch that I've never experienced before. Her mouth against mine is whispering promises like the determination of her words can somehow chase away the lump in her breast. Her hands are gentle, but urgent when she leans into me and slides them under my robe. I'm nude underneath it and when she parts my legs with her knees ... I moan and scoot to the edge of the stool to give her access. I feel her smile through her tears as her long, nimble fingers part my flesh and her thumb finds my clit. She's careful with me, careful to steer clear of my shoulders when she kisses down my neck, but she's hell-bent on chasing away the vestiges of our heavy conversation all the same. Her free hand pulls the belt on my robe and she takes my nipple into her mouth, laving it with her tongue, scraping with her teeth.

My body hums to life under her ministrations. There's never a requirement for preamble with her. The slightest touch, a whisper against my ear, even something as mundane as brushing against me when she reaches past me for something will jump start the desire I always feel for her. I can quiet it for work and keep it under control for the most part, but there's never an instant that I won't rise to the challenge if she issues it. If she invites me ... I'll come. Again and again and again. When she kisses my stomach and moves to her knees ... I'm gone. She urges my legs to rest over her shoulder and covers me with her mouth. It never fails to amaze me how every time feels like the first time all over again. There's a magic in what she does to me, something new, something extraordinary. I've had amazing sex before, but I was right in what I said to my mother ... Erica makes love to me. She puts everything she feels for me into her touch and it's more than what she does to my body ... it's what she does to my heart. It's real. It's so fucking real that I can't stand it.

"Oh ... God ..." My hand moves to her hair, gripping her ponytail as she does something with her tongue that curls my toes. "Erica ... ooooh ... don't stop."

Two fingers slide into me and I'm done. My skin burns hotter than it did in the sun with Jasper as I surrender and let her push me over the edge that she keeps me poised at all the time. It amazes me how she can let me fall without ever letting go completely. My brain bull rushes me with a million and one sweet nothings to say to her as her mouth moves to my belly button ... but the unthinkable happens before I can tell her what I'm thinking.

The overhead light comes on and my mother is standing there in her embroidered lounger, her hair mussed. The empty coffee cup she's carrying clatters to the floor and Erica leaps to her feet, trying to pull my robe over my nude body. Because I'm trying to do the same thing we make it worse and she finally steps in front of me to shield me from my mother's view. To say that I'm mortified is putting it mildly. I am so utterly undone that I can barely breathe. It was bad when my mother found the two of us naked in bed. I vacillated between wanting to die and needing her to forgive me. This time ... she saw Erica with her head between my thighs and that pretty much answers the burning question she's had about what Erica and I do in bed. I finally get my robe secured and the silence in the room makes the stool scraping as I push it back sound like a gunshot. I feel like a bullet has gone straight through me. I feel like I'm sixteen and I've just been busted doing something horrific. Like heroin. Or slaughtering an animal for ritual sacrifice ... because Mom acts that way. She puts a hand over her mouth and bursts into tears that sound absolutely gut wrenching. And those sobs give way to a rant that makes the hairs on the back of my neck dance upward.

I can only understand a few of the words she's sputtering.

Filth.

Perversion.

Disgusting.

And ... whore.

I think it's whore more than anything else that gets under Erica's skin. While I stand there with mortification turning my blood to ice water in my veins, Erica puts her hands on her hips and says, "What did you just call her? Or were you talking to me?"

Mom shakes her head and closes her eyes, but she quickly reopens them like the image of what she just witnessed has been burned into the back of her eyelids. "Callie, this cannot possibly be what you want out of your life. It's ... you're sick. You need help. Honey, you need -"

"Don't! Don't you dare say anything else!" I snap and the mortification is rapidly becoming anger. "You are the one who needs help! I am fine!"

"Why are you doing this?" she asks, running a hand through her hair. Her color has faded to mostly gray and so help me God ... I feel guilty for contributing to that. "This is not what I want for you. This is not the life that I suffered through eighteen hours of labor to give you. I had plans for you. I had dreams and -- you had a bride doll when you were seven and you begged me to have a dress made for you that matched hers. You took your Holy Communion in that dress, Calliope! You did! You walked down that aisle and you gave your life to God so why are you doing this!? Why!?"

"My life is mine! And stop acting like you understand Holy Communion. You're Baptist, for God's sake!"

"And I had you baptized too! To cover all the bases! Because as your mother, it's my job to raise you right. I had such hopes for you!"

"Don't pin your hopes and dreams on someone else, Mother, because then you deserve to be disappointed. I'm not living for YOU."

"THANK GOD! IF YOU WERE I'D BE SUICIDAL! ELOPING, DIVORCING, BEING GAY! WHAT OTHER WAY CAN YOU DISAPPOINT ME!?"

"You should be happy that I am happy! That should be enough for you!"

"YOU ARE NOT HAPPY!" she yells. "YOUR CAR WAS DESTROYED! THIS HOUSE WAS SPRAY PAINTED! AND -"

"I AM STILL WITH THE PERSON I LOVE SO I'M ECSTATIC!"

"BULLSHIT!" Mom screams. "THIS IS ALL HER DOING, CALLIOPE! DON'T YOU SEE THAT!? SHE IS WRONG FOR YOU! MARK WAS -"

"STOP IT! NOW!" Erica shouts and her voice is back to that strong, powerful silken vibrato that makes you listen. "Not another word from either one of you."

"Don't you tell me -" Mom begins.

"THIS IS MY HOUSE!" Erica bellows. "MY RULES!"

"Erica -" I begin softly.

"No! No, Callie! This is ridiculous!" When she looks at me, her blue eyes are swimming in tears. "I won't apologize for not being Mark Sloan because frankly ... I'm sure I'm a better person. I won't apologize for falling in love with you or let her act like it's the worst thing to ever happen to someone." She turns back to my mother and I can see that her nostrils are flaring. That's a very, very bad sign. "Lori Anne, I have invited you into my home and welcomed you after you refused to extend that same courtesy to me in Miami. I have shown you nothing but respect and tried to include you in our life so you can see for yourself that we're in love and we're happy. No, it's not easy and because you know that, because you've witnessed what attitudes like yours do to us ... to her ... you should know better. So don't you say another word unless it's an apology to her because someone may have destroyed her car, but you just destroyed her. And you're her MOTHER."

Mom, whose tiny slippered foot could fit easily in my hand, kicks her coffee cup across the floor. I listen to it shatter against the wall as she turns on her heel and stalks from the room. It's the breaking more than the vanishing that hurts ... it's the sound of something being irreparably damaged. I hear every piece fall apart and glance down at the mess. It's near my bare foot and I think stepping on it would hurt less than seeing it ... or at the very least it would put the focus off my love life and onto my wounds. Before I can step toward it, Erica takes my hand and pulls me into her arms. I realize it then ... I don't have to have any open sores for her to see that I'm bleeding out.

"I'm sorry," she whispers against my hair. "I am so sorry."

"It's not your fault." I hang onto her and realize that she's trembling. I think maybe my mother destroyed Erica just as much as she destroyed me ... but Erica isn't the type of person to let that show. "I need some air. Let's take a walk."

Neither of us have shoes on and I'm wearing nothing but my robe, but we still head into the backyard. The sun hasn't shown its face and I glance up, wrinkling my nose at the clouds in the sky. At least Mother Nature matched the weather with my mood. Halfway to the gazebo, Erica lets my hand go, drawing up short. "Do you want me to go apologize to her, Cal?"

"Only if you want me to kick your ass."

"I never want you to think you have to choose between -"

"I'm not. She's the one who has a choice to make, Yellow. Not me. I'm not changing who I am for her. She can take it or leave it."

"She's your mother. You love her."

"You're right. I do. I love her even though she's not perfect and she has to decide if she can do the same for me."

"This is so god damned unbelievable!" She shakes her head. "You know ... when you told me that Lori Anne was a little bit crazy and that she preached a sermon when you got divorced ... I kinda thought you were kidding."

A drop of rain hits me on the nose and I hold my hand out to her, nodding toward the gazebo. We make it under the canopy before the bottom drops out and I wait for her to sit down before I join her. She studies my face and I try to keep the agony I am feeling off my features, but something in hers tells me that I'd doing a piss poor job. Her eyes are full of the same desperation that I felt in her kiss earlier. I don't know what to say to make it better, to ease her mind. I've saved from having to say anything by the back door slamming and my father stalking toward us. "Oh god."

There's something about seeing my father in boxer shorts and a wife beater that makes me want to kill myself. Or at the very least ... dig a hole under the gazebo and stay there until he goes back inside and gives up ... or gets dressed. His boxer shorts are black and white and the black socks he's wearing should come up to his knees, but they look like ankle socks. I'm sure they're soaked when he climbs the steps of the gazebo and glares at me. This is what we've been reduced to. This. It's a hard dose of reality. "Are you okay, Mija?"

"I'm fine."

"Erica, I am very, very sorry for my wife's behavior. I've made it excessively clear that this is the only time I will be apologizing for her."

"It's okay, Santos."

"No, it not," he replies, flopping down on the bench across from us. He looks back and forth between us and I have little doubt that my mother told him exactly what she walked in on earlier. "I don't understand how she can treat the two of you the same way her family treated us. Even after I married her ... I was never good enough. It was my skin color, my heritage. Now she's holding Erica's gender against her and it makes me sick. I just ... I won't abide it. She will not win this round."

"Dad, in case you failed to notice ... she's chased you out of the house in your underwear."

He seems to realize for the first time that this is the case. Looking down at himself, he swears beautifully, pulling his socks up. He does it like covering his calves makes ups for the fact that he's practically indecent. "Yes, well, that was my doing. Not hers. I wanted to make sure you were okay. Both of you."

I'm touched and I can tell that Erica is as well because she's watching him with a sweet grin on her face. I clear my throat and say, "We are. Okay, I mean. Although, I'm really beginning to understand why the gay and lesbian community has such a high suicide rate. It sucks."

He shakes his head. "I'm sorry, kitten. If I could change her ... I would."

"No, you wouldn't. You love her. You don't try to change the people you love," I reply. "Although, there is nothing wrong with educating her."

"It's like teaching a brick wall to dance the Salsa," he says.

"Hey, I taught Addison to Salsa. Stranger things have happened." I laugh, but it isn't genuine. "I really don't think I can fight with her anymore. I'm close to saying things that I'll regret and I don't want to do that."

He gets to his feet and gives me a kiss on the head, then does to the same to Erica. "I'm going to take her back to the Archfield. Jasper has to do a few tests at the hospital today anyway. The two of you need some time alone and frankly, I'm certain that your mother will have a heart attack if she stays here and sees anything else ... untoward."

"Untoward, Dad? Step into this century."

Wagging his finger at me, he winks and heads back across the yard.

I lean my head against Erica's shoulder.

We must stay that way for a while because when we go inside ... my parents are gone and they've taken my brother with them.

Going back to bed is the only thing that makes any sense so I take my medication and do just that.

The phone rings, cutting through the Vicodin that sent me for a loop. Erica stirs beside me and sits up, fumbling for the source of the noise. I listen to her speak in clipped tones and then she gives someone our address. I fall asleep again, even though I'm curious what visitor is on the way. The answer comes in no time. I hear the chime that indicates that someone is trying to penetrate the fortress by pressing the call button on the newly installed fence and sit up. Once again, Erica's not in the bed and I pull on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, running my hand through my tangled hair before I go in search of her. I'm halfway down the hall when I hear Addison and she's crying.

Surely ...

Surely the results haven't come back.

She's not here to ...

... kill me.

I step into the living room and watch Erica relieve Addison of her purse and lead her to the sofa. Addy falls over her own feet and cackles through her tears, tumbling face down. I rush forward and help her sit up and the smell of liquor takes my breath away, causing me to wrinkle my nose. "Jeez, Addison."

"I can't do it anymore," she sobs, reaching up and grabbing hold of me. Her eyes are hooded and dark under the wide brim of the baseball cap she's wearing. "Look at what's happened to me!"

I pry her fingers off before she rips my favorite Miami Dolphins shirt. "Addy, what the hell are you doing?"

"JOE WOULD NOT LET ME GET ALCOHOL POISONING AND I TRIED," she wails. "I REALLY FREAKIN' TRIED! HE CUT ME OFF! BASTARD CUT ME OFF! Do you have any tequila? I'll take vodka, too. Even beer. Any beer?"

I meet Erica's eyes and she shrugs, shaking her head slightly to tell me that she doesn't have any more of a clue than I do. The clock says that it's only two thirty in the afternoon and from the looks of Addison, she must have started drinking at the same time of the morning that my mother probably wished for something stiff to drink. "We need to feed her," I say, patting Addison on the cheek. "Are you hungry?"

"No," Addison snaps, pushing my hand away. "You're my friend, right?"

"Always," I assure her.

"Then help me kill him, Callie. You know how to break bones. Just ... break his neck and I'll dig the hole. No ... no ... I won't dig a hole. I can do real labor like that. We can put him in the incinerator. The Archfield has a big one." Her blue eyes widen. "Wait, don't break his neck. I - I'd rather beat him to death with forceps and you can dig the hole because you owe me that much."

"What did he do?" I ask.

"He's Mark." Addison throws her hands in the air. "That good for nothing, lying, crappy ass ... why the hell does he have to be what I want? WHY!? And if he has to be the one ... why couldn't I have realized it before I ever left Seattle?"

Taking her hand, I say, "You know now. That's what counts."

"BUT I HATE HIM!" she yells, then jumps to her feet. The baseball cap that she's wearing low over her head falls off and reveals her hair. It's ... horrible. There's no other word for it. It's no longer dark brown. I'm not sure what she's done to it exactly but the color is definitely not on God's color wheel. Actually ... it's not even one color. It's solid white with a few green stripes. She catches me looking and says, "I tried to make it red again. He liked the red."

"Uh ... were you already drinking when you did it?" Erica asks, picking up a strand of Addison's hair that would probably glow in the dark. Possibly ... it could be seen from outer space as well. It may be radioactive. It's that bad.

"A little," Addy replies, then belches."Oh shit. I think I'm gonna puke."

"I got it," Erica picks up the trash can that we usually keep in the spare bathroom. The garbage bag has already been stripped and I watch her hold it up and catch the steady stream of liquor that pours from our drunken friend. As Addison heaves, Erica addresses me, "Joe called and said that she came in at lunchtime and was already three sheets to the wind. He didn't know who else to call."

I sigh when I see the state of Addison's clothing. Dried vomit is covering the thin beige linen and I wrinkle my nose. "You want to make her a sandwich? I'll put her in the shower."

Erica bites her bottom lip, staring from me to her. "I don't mind doing shower duty."

If I didn't know better ... I'd say that Erica was very, very uneasy about me seeing Addison naked. I bite back the smile that threatens to break across my features and say, "I've got her."

Handing me the garbage can, Erica nods and eases Addison back onto the sofa. She gives me a kiss and heads into the kitchen, where the clatter of pots and pans promises something much nicer than a sandwich. I wait until Addison is dry heaving only and say, "You know you can't hold alcohol for shit."

"I know. God, it sucks to be me."

"What did Mark do?"

"It's what he WON'T do."

"What won't he do?"

"Me." She sobs the answer and I rub the back of her head. "I hope the next hard on he gets is terminal. I hope the fucker stiffens up and falls off. Like a damn rotten tree branch. I hope he goes to whack it and forgets that he's got a scalpel in his hand. Fucker."

"You really shouldn't drink again. Ever. Has the nausea passed?"

"I think so."

"You need a shower. Don't even ask me to wash your pants."

"MY PANTS!" she shoots to her feet, nearly knocking me on my ass. "These are Gucci!"

"Now they're pukey. Come on, wino."

I half drag her to the bathroom because she has lost the concept of walking. My shoulders pay the price and I have to grit my teeth because she digs her nails into my arm as she stumbles over the throw rug. It's work, but I manage to get her heels off (one is broken) and help her into the shower. Erica has nothing to worry about. I pay about as much attention to Addison's nudity as I do Jasper's when I bathe him. The only difference between the two is the fact that Addison drenches me in an attempt to add more hot water to the cold that is assaulting her. I block her, spray her off and watch as she does a piss poor job of washing herself. It's enough, however, and Erica arrives with a Tweety Bird gown just in time to see the big finale, where Addison misses stepping on the fluffy bath mat and takes me to the ground with her.

Erica eventually pulls her off me and we get her dressed in the gown. Addison refuses to eat any lunch and burrows into the bed. I take a moment to notice that Erica has changed the linens. She's always efficient in everything that she does. Whether it's operating on someone or running the house, she's on top of things all the time. I wish I had the same abilities, but I don't. I didn't even remember to bring a change of clothing into the bathroom.

"She'll be okay," Erica says, taking my hand. "Let her sleep it off."

"The only thing worse than the hangover ... is going to be her reaction when she sees that head of hair." I push Addison's foot under the cover and follow Erica into the hallway. I can already smell something amazing and my stomach rumbles appreciatively. "God, I'm starving."

"We slept through breakfast and lunch."

We sit down at the island to enjoy a lunch of warmed up roast and pasta salad. If I can manage to not gain three thousand pounds living with her ... I'll call it an accomplishment. I'm working on my second helping of roast when she clears her throat and says, "Callie, you said something today that I didn't like."

Considering that I didn't say much of anything in the wake of Hurricane Lori Anne, I'm baffled. I chew a carrot as long as I can, swallow, and take a sip of water. "I did?"

"You told Santos that you understand why the suicide rate is so high with gays and lesbians. That scared me."

"Uh ... I'm sorry?"

"Don't be sorry. If this is too much for you ... if you're thinking something like that ... then -"

"I'm not." I put my hand over hers and squeeze. "The only time I ever seriously thought about killing myself was after Jasper's accident ... and after Miami. Being without you is more horrible than anything that can happen with you."

She tilts her head to one side, studying my face. When she looks at me that way, I feel like an open book that she's read so many times that the pages are dog eared and the spine is creased. I feel like she could recite the words that constitute my being without even trying. There's something wonderful and horrible about being with someone who knows you that way. There are no secrets, no hidden places. She's mapped me and could travel the expanse of me in an instant. "You're right," she tells me. "It was bad after Miami."

"Yeah."

"We really shouldn't talk about that because when I think about that ... I'm visited with the urge to frail the Hell out of you with an iron skillet."

"I'm visited with the urge to let you." I put my fingers through hers and hang onto her. "I won't bother blaming it on my mother because I'm an adult, but -"

"We're not talking about that." She gives me her 'case closed' look. "Because that is the closest I've ever come to suicide."

I'm not hungry at all anymore. As a matter of fact, the lunch that I ate is weighing like a lead ball in my stomach and I'd like nothing more than to pull an Addison and puke it back up. I knew I hurt her ... but never like that. Erica and I have carefully avoided rehashing that horrible expanse of time after Miami. We haven't talked about the fact that I slept with her and then ignored her or that I went to live with Mark. Unless I'm mistaken, my mother's outburst has brought that fateful morning in Florida back to the forefront of her mind. It was that moment, when my mother scared me 'straight', that set the tone for months of fighting what we knew was true. "Can I apologize for that?"

"No." She lifts my hand to her mouth and kisses it. "Just don't do it again."

"Do you actually listen to anything I say to you? I've made it very clear ... many, many times ... that I'm here to stay. We're making plans, Erica. We're talking about kids and commitment and forever. We have the rings, the house, the ... everything. If you're pissed at my mother then be pissed at my mother, but don't be pissed at me. In case you failed to notice ... I stood up for us this time."

She stops me when I push my stool back. "I know you did, baby. I just ... family is important to you. I don't want to be a wedge between you and Lori Anne. You will resent me for that one day and -"

"No, I won't. I know who's at fault and it's not you. She's the wedge."

We leave it at that.

If she's unconvinced, she does a great job convincing me otherwise. We play online Jeopardy, where she doesn't even give me a pity win, then settle in front of Pay Per View with popcorn.

My mother doesn't call me and when I call my Dad, he tells me that she's sticking to her guns, but he's working on it.

Addison sleeps like the dead.

And we pass yet another day in the wait for the final verdict on the lump in Erica's breast.

All I can say is ... at least it's been eventful. It kept our minds off the wait.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!"

I just want sleep. One full night of not tossing, not turning, and not waking up before the ass crack of dawn would be fine with me. The clock tells me that it's five thirty in the morning and the scream rattles through me as I fight clumsily to free myself from the cover. My attempts are in vain and I fall out of the bed in my haste to rise. Erica is already half out the door by the time I'm on my feet all the way. I chase after her and when she darts into the guest bathroom, I remember that Addison has spent the night. Addy woke up briefly, gorged herself on spaghetti, and went straight back to sleep. Now, she's wide awake and she's witnessing her hair in all its chemical catastrophe glory. I bite my lip when she whirls and looks at me.

"Callie!"

"I didn't do it."

"I wanna be drunk again!" she cries. "Oh my GOD!"

Erica pats her on the back. "I have a friend who owns a salon in town and she's opening up early. Hang in there a couple of more hours."

"MY HAIR!" Addison screeches, pointing at her reflection. "WHAT HAPPENED!?"

"Never, ever drink and dye," I tell her. "Just say no. On the plus side ... Erica washed your clothes."

Addison impulsively hugs Erica then self consciously rubs her hair the same way Jasper does. "Do you have a paper bag I could use as well?"

In the end, Addy employs her baseball cap again. Erica tries hard to get me stay home and 'rest', but I assure her that I'm fine. My nose has started to peel and I can't wear any makeup because of it, but the prospect of getting out of the house is just too inviting. I tell Erica that we're going to Pike Place for chocolate as I get dressed. I pull my hair into a ponytail, tame my bangs, and smooth lip gloss over my lips before I join Addison in the living room. We talk about my mother's latest outburst while we wait for Erica and when she comes into the room, my eyes move over her in open appreciation. She's the only person I know who can make jeans and flip flops look that good and the fact that she's wearing one of my shirts makes me smile with satisfaction. I feel sorely underdressed in my shorts and boy beater, but I'm comfortable all the same.

As we drive into town, Addison tells us the story of what transpired with Mark the previous day. After working together on a pregnant patient who fell through sliding glass doors, Mark invited Addison back to his apartment where he made a pallet for himself on the sofa and told her to sleep in his bed. Even though she walked naked to the kitchen for a bottle of water, he didn't take her up on the unspoken offer. Instead, he barely looked away from the movie he was watching and asked if she needed anything. She told him that she needed him and he simply shook his head. When he went to take a shower, presumably a cold one, she got dressed and left. I reach into the backseat and take her hand when she starts to cry.

"I just don't get it," she tells me, sniffling. "I mean, we were having sex the night you came back to the Archfield and interrupted us. And we ... almost had sex in California when he went back with me. He made it clear he didn't want me to move back there and said we could try, but this doesn't feel like trying. This feels like humiliating me as often as he possibly can and I don't understand why."

"It's not your fault," I assure her. "He's been hurt, you know? So he's going slow."

"This isn't slow. This is a dead stop." She pulls a tissue out of her purse and dabs at her eyes. "I wish I had never left at all. Hell, I wish we had both stayed in New York. If I had done things differently ... we'd have a kid now and could have been married. Whoever said hindsight is twenty twenty needs a gold medal in stating the obvious."

I rub my thumb over her hand. There's something about watching a close friend suffer that makes you forget all of your own problems. "Here's the thing," I say, almost tentatively. "Mark's not the same man you cheated on Derek with. Hell, he's not even the same man you left behind when you moved to California. He grew up, Addison. He's funny, patient and insanely loyal. He became that guy who understands monogamy and didn't bat an eyelash when I refused to have sex with him for months. He made it clear that he'd wait and when we finally did ... it was about me and not about -"

"This conversation? Sucks." Erica shoots me a warning look as she stops at a red light. "Get to the G-rated point, Calliope."

Addison grins at me and I chuckle a little before I continue. "The point is ... he's a good guy. He's a different guy. And maybe he's trying to show you that there are more important things than sex."

"There are?"

"Addison!"

"This is your advice? Hang in there and be horny?"

"Hang in there and buy a vibrator," I offer, shrugging apologetically for the lack of real wisdom. "Don't you see what's happening? If Mark isn't having sex with you then odds are he's not having sex with anyone. Mark Sloan is not having sex. That means that the only thing he's getting out of this thing with you ... is you. He'll get your groin later."

"At least it's a natural color. I'm the original firecrotch," she replies, picking up a lock of hair that fell out from under her cap. "What if they have to shave my head?"

"They won't." Erica pulls to a stop in front of a small brick building. "Eleanor is great at what she does. I once watched her save a girl whose hair was falling out in clumps."

We pull to a stop in front of a brick building and I look at the sign on the door.

Helen's Hair Design.

Helen.

Where have I ...

Surely it's not the infamous ...

... yes it is.

I watch as Erica's ex-girlfriend walks around the side of the building. Her head is down and she's digging through her purse for something, but I'd still know her anywhere. She's not wearing a blue robe now. She's wearing a short, girly pink skirt and a midriff baring shirt that showcases her flat stomach which comes complete with a diamond in her belly button. She's not tall, but the high heels she's wearing makes her look like she belongs on a runway somewhere. Thighs like her ... are usually the final result in a magazine after hours of airbrushing and her calves are perfect. She drops something out of her bag and retrieves it and I can see that she's not wearing a bra ... she doesn't need a bra.

In the backseat, Addison says, "Please tell me that I'm not getting my hair done by the eighteen year old beauty queen. I don't need to feel any worse about myself."

"Fuck," Erica mumbles, but she doesn't look at me. She seems as paralyzed as I am.

Helen stands up, spots Erica and bounces up and down with excitement. Her breasts don't move an inch and I suddenly hate that gravity exists for me at all. I watch her wrench Erica's door open and hug her. She openly appraises me over Erica's shoulder and there's something defiant in her face that I'd love to slap off. She's beautiful. Her eyes are catlike, even without the heavy eyeliner on her top lid, and she smells like baby powder, making me feel like I should smell like something geriatric. I suddenly feel like a fat, frumpy, old nothing in my shorts and tank top. When she pulls back, she beams at Erica and says, "Mom isn't feeling well this morning. I told her I'd come in and take care of your friend." Her eyes move to me again. "What did you do to your hair?"

"Uh," Erica points her thumb into the backseat. "Actually -"

"It's me." Addison leans forward, between the bucket seats. She's taken her hat off and she points at her white/green hair apologetically. "Help me."

"Oh ... wow." Helen scrunches her perfect button nose and twirls a lock of her own chestnut hair around her manicured finger as if she has to make sure it's still there, still perfect. "Looks like we have our work cut out for us, honey, come on in. Erica, you need make a coffee run. You know what I like."

I realize that my mouth is slightly ajar when Addison hops out of the backseat and follows Helen to the front door. I watch them go, barely breathing. Helen doesn't even come up to Addison's shoulder, but she seems larger than life. The wind picks up the ends of her long hair, causing the waves to ripple like a fucking Pantene commercial and I'm still staring after them when they disappear into the building. If it's possible to survive a steamroller mowing you down ... that's what I'm currently doing. My lungs feel ruptured when I try to use them and I swallow hard, watching as Helen opens the blinds in the front window and sashays prettily, her eyes on mine. She lifts one foot, resting it on the window ledge as she adjusts the strap on her heel. When she winks at me ... I want to drive through the front glass and mow her down.

"I am so sorry," Erica tells me softly. "I - I called Eleanor ... that's her mother ... she owns this place. I - never dreamed that Helen would show up."

There are no words. Really. None. Somehow, I still find a way to say, " That ... that's the kind of girl you like?"

"Callie -"

"I mean ... she's ... a kid."

"She's twenty eight."

"And you said that you hate a lot of makeup."

"We've been through this already. She was con-"

"Convenient. Right. You told me." I unbuckle my seatbelt and grab my purse from the floorboard. "Go fetch her coffee, Erica. Maybe she'll say thanks by letting you fuck her in the back room. I'm sure she's just as easy as she looks."

Erica hits a button on her door, locking mine. She puts the car in reverse and we pull away. I glance at front window again and Helen is smirking. She waggles her fingers at me and turns back to Addison, who is flipping through a book of some kind. The bitch is trying to get under my skin. And it's fucking working like a charm. I cross my arms over my chest when Erica tries to take my hand again and glare out the windshield.

"Put your seatbelt on," she tells me.

"Shut up."

My shorts are solid white and when I look down at my thighs, I think that two years on a stair climber wouldn't be enough. I cross my legs and it doesn't make me feel any better. All I can feel now is a roll of fat under my crossed arms, where the band of my shorts have pushed my stomach upward. I attempt to suck it in, but it only makes the wire of my bra more pronounced. Perky was something I stopped being in the eighth grade. There's no diamond on my stomach either, just a long scar and few stretch marks from my weight yo-yoing for years. And there's obviously something wrong with my hair because Helen asked me what I did to it. I'm surprised she noticed it at all over my peeling nose and chipmunk cheeks. I don't say anything when Erica pulls to a stop in front of Starbucks. Of COURSE she's going to do Helen's bidding and take her coffee.

"Listen to me," Erica begins.

"No."

"I didn't know that she would be there."

"Since when are you friends with her mother!?"

Erica massages her forehead and it's a silent warning that I'm close to pissing her off. "This is where I remind you that you are friends with O'Malley's mother, with O'Malley himself, and you spent ten minutes this morning singing Mark's praises. I'm not friends with Helen. Her mother, however, has been coloring my hair for a while and I genuinely like her. I don't have many friends, Cal, so the ones that I have ... I tend to keep."

"Whatever."

She shuts the engine off and takes the keys from the ignition. "Are you going to come inside and have coffee with me?"

"We wouldn't want to keep her waiting."

"Fuck her, Callie! I don't give a damn! Just yesterday you were reminding me all about how we have plans and rings and now you're acting like none of it matters. She exists. I can't change the fact that she exists or that I was with her for a while. Who the fuck cares, though!? I don't! And you shouldn't!"

"I'm not going back there."

"I'm not asking you to. I'm asking you to come inside and have coffee with me and then we'll go to Pike Place when it opens at nine. When Addison's finished, she can call us."

"Right and then your little girlfriend will think that she scared me away!"

"So which is it!? You want to go back or you don't want to go back?"

"Hell if I know."

"What do you want to do!?"

"I don't know that either!"

In a completely shocking turn of events, Erica starts laughing. She doesn't just chuckle, it's a full fledged belly laugh that stops just shy of a cackle. I watch in astounded silence as she leans her head back against the seat and closes her eyes. Instead of pissing me off, instead of making me scream in anger, the sound of it chases my aggravation away. I listen to her howl with unadulterated glee and shake my head. "I'm so glad I can amuse you."

"Baby, even on your worst day ... you amuse me, amaze me ... all of it." Leaning forward, she gives me a kiss, still smiling when she pulls back. "There are so many other things that we're inevitably going to fight about. This shouldn't be one of them."

"I didn't realize that she was so ... beautiful. I mean ... why would you want to be with me when -"

"Okay, to borrow your words ... shut up. YOU are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen." She reaches up and touches my nose. "Even when your skin is falling off ... you take my breath away. I love you. I want to be with you because I've been without you and I hated it. Even when she was there ... I hated it and I hated her ... because she wasn't you."

"Fine. I hate when you make me feel like a child."

"Well, I hate that you make it so easy sometimes. We all have our crosses to bear, huh?"

"Touché."

"Are we finished now?"

"I guess, but if she fucks up Addison's hair ... you're not jumping in when I help Addy kick her ass."

"Deal."

"I'm sorry," I tell her, rubbing her cheek. "I'm a bitch. I'm also ... sort of the jealous type."

"We're in the same boat. The thought of you helping Addison in the shower yesterday nearly drove me insane."

"Is that why you showed up when you did?"

"Yep."

"We're pathetic."

"Yep."

"I don't mind."

"Me either, baby." She winks at me and gets out of the car.

After spending nearly an hour at Starbucks, I text Addison and tell her to call me when she's finished. Erica and I opt for walking to Pike Place and even though it's overcast and muggy, she grumbles the entire way about my lack of sunscreen. I have to remind her that Mark prescribed something different for my stomach that doesn't react to the sun, but it doesn't help. She threatens to buy Coppertone at every store we past. The walk to the market takes forty five minutes because we stop a couple of times to window shop and by the time we arrive, Pike Place is already bustling with activity. Erica fawns over the fruits while I gravitate toward the candies, picking up a couple of boxes of suckers for Jasper. As a peace offering, I also buy a box of white truffles, which are my mother's favorite. When we drop Addison off at the Archfield, I'm going to give them to her. Maybe it'll work. I find my dad some gummy crap that he keeps on his desk at home and a T-shirt that says 'I bench press. Do you?' He's so proud of himself for embracing the gym.

I'm enjoying the fresh air, even if the smell of fish is overpowering at times, when I see Mark and Derek. He notices me at the same time and throws a hand up, walking toward me. We meet in the middle of the crowd and he smiles down at me, lifting my arm as he examines the burn. "Did I not tell you to keep this covered?"

He plucks a couple of pieces of lint from the worst of it and I watch his face. You can usually gauge how Mark's mood is by his grooming. Right now, he's got that carefree stubble that is expertly shaped and maintained. He's in a good mood. "So," I say, "Addison spent the night with us last night. She was pretty much drunk off her ass."

Mark drops my arm like it's burned him and clears his throat. "Oh yeah?"

"I know it's none of my business, but she did come back to Seattle to be with you. I think she's getting a little ... frustrated. And Naomi is holding her job in California. Just. In. Case."

"Callie-"

"Look, all I'm saying is she could leave and if you want her to stay ... you should give her a reason."

He puts his hands in his pockets until I shift my bag of sugary sweetness from one hip to the other. When I do that, he reaches out and takes it from me. "I don't really think I should take relationship advice from someone who fucked me over."

The smile on his face lessens the sting from the venom and I nod at a bench a few feet away. We sit down and I turn a little so I can face him. It's so easy to remember how it used to be ... when we were friends. I'm reminded of the way we'd spend lazy hours doing a whole lot of nothing except this right here ... sitting, talking. We could pass an entire day people watching and making up stories about the more colorful characters we'd see. As if reading my mind, Mark leans forward and says, "Like old times, huh?"

"It's kinda sad that we have old times. We're still here. We still work together and see each other almost daily." I bite my bottom lip, keeping an eye on his jaw muscles. If I push too far, they'll let me know before he does. "Look, I'm not asking you to wear a BFF necklace or anything ... I'm asking you to not let what I did to you hurt any longer than it has to. I want you to be okay. I want you to be happy. And I trust Addison when she tells me that she wants you, Mark. I think you guys could have something now."

"It's not that easy."

"Nothing worth having is ever easy. My mom says that all the time and she's right. About that, anyway."

"Is she giving you a hard time about Erica?" he asks.

"Ohhh yeah. I'm a perverted, disgusting whore."

His eyes widen and I can see that he's gritting his teeth. "Jesus."

"It sucks."

"Well, yeah." He reaches over and touches my arm. "I'll talk to Addison."

I raise my brows. "I don't think she wants to talk, Sloan."

He laughs now and a couple of people glance our way. I see them smile with him ... some people look for reasons to be happy ... even if they're only borrowing someone else's. "I'll keep that in mind."

I get to my feet when Erica walks out of a specialty shop and glances around for me. She strikes up a conversation with Derek and I say, "He's operating on Jasper. If he can get the approval for the trial."

"He'll get it. And Jasper will be fine."

I nod at him, watching him retrieve my bag, which he carries for me. To the casual observer, we probably look like two couples. Erica's standing near Derek, laughing at something he's saying and Mark has his hand on the small of my back as we slice through the crowd. In another time, in another world, that could be the case. I reach out and take Erica's hand, however, shattering the illusion. Mark holds my bag out and I reach for it, but she takes it before I can, frowning when she sees the contents. She mumbles something about my sweet tooth and greets Mark with a nod. I listen as he asks her about a mutual patient and hold my breath as they make small talk about a memo Webber sent out about attending policy. Derek catches my eye and winks at me and I breathe a little easier.

When we part ways, Erica gives me a kiss. "Do you see what I did there?" she asks. "How I'm not freaking out or trying to start a fight?"

"Yes yes ... you should be canonized for your Saintlike behavior."

The walk back to the car takes less time because she teases me about my temper the entire way. My phone rings when we're two blocks from the car and Addison tells me that she's ready. She also says that she loves her hair, but something in her voice makes me think that may not be the case at all. She's guarded. We load our loot into the car and make the drive back to the salon. Erica keeps it light, singing off key with the radio as she navigates traffic. My stomach starts to tingle as we pull into the parking lot. Addison is standing in front of the building and her hair is back to her signature red. It's Absolutely Addison Auburn ... at least ... that's what I'd call it if I named colors. She looks beautiful. She gives me her patented Addy grin as she strikes a pose. I have to laugh at her and beside me, Erica does the same. I don't see hide nor hair of Helen as Addison climbs into the backseat and Erica doesn't hang around long enough to see if the other woman will make an appearance.

"I love it," I tell Addison, smiling back at her.

"Yeah, well, I didn't love Helen. She thinks you're an illegal alien, Callie."

"Nice. I haven't heard that in a while." If I ever get near the salon again ... I may have to stop in and beat that woman's ass with my birth certificate.

"Don't worry," Addy tells me. "I didn't give her a great tip. She runs her mouth a little too damn much."

I watch Erica meet Addison's eyes in the rearview mirror and make the decision that the less I know ... the better. I change the subject as we head to the Archfield and tell Erica that I think we should go up and see my parents. We're walking across the parking deck when Addison's phone rings. Erica and I walk a few steps ahead to wait for her. I'm kissing her neck when Addison rushes toward us. I can tell that something has happened by the look on her face and I brace myself for whatever she has to say.

She doesn't disappoint.

"The results are back. Erica, I've got your results."


	21. Chapter 21

I have waited for news a million times. When Jazz was injured, I waited from my hospital bed for the final diagnosis and when it came, I sank into myself and didn't speak for several hours. Even before that, I applied for early acceptance at every school I could think of and would sit beside the every day mailbox awaiting judgment. I even waited for George to decide, once and for all, if he wanted me ... and I'm really not the kind of person to put my life and its direction in someone else's hands. I know what waiting is though. I've never been particularly fond of the necessity for it, however.

The ten feet it takes for Addison to get to us with the news is life or death. Literally. What she says could change everything ... for the worst. Malignant is such a gross, disgusting word. I've said it a few times, telling a patient that it's bone cancer giving them pain and not arthritis. The news can be met either way. Some people fall apart and cry ... other people greet the devastation with a resolved tilt of their chin, determined to be stronger than the disease. I lift my chin now, but I take a small step back as if that extra foot of space will be enough to brace me for whatever onslaught is coming. Like that twelve inches of space can give me a second longer of not knowing ... because not knowing hasn't killed me yet. I want to prolong it ... like a sadist.

Knowing ... could kill us both.

Addison's face is a mask as she puts her phone away and I want to shake her, throttle her. She can't be a doctor right now. She has to laugh or cry so that I can laugh or cry. I'm holding my breath when Erica takes my hand and hers is cold and clammy against mine. It feels like the dead fish that used to wash ashore in Miami. Joel would chase me with them, sliding the cold, dead length against my spine as I tried to get away. I don't run from Erica. I don't try to find the nearest hiding place and cower from what COULD be because what is ... is US. We're in this thing together and if I have to die a million times along the way ... it's worth it. We're worth it.

When Addison gets her phone stowed away she looks up at us and smiles. It's that careless, crooked, sweet and good way that makes the breath in my lungs swoop out in a rush. "It's benign," she says, rubbing Erica on the arm. "Everything's just fine."

Erica takes the news by running a hand over her face. It requires Addison repeating the results again for either one of us to truly react. When you dodge a bullet, endorphins kick in. Your adrenaline goes haywire and epinephrine sends your heart rate into overdrive. I feel like I just leaped out of the way of a speeding train ... pulling Erica with me at the last possible second. The icy hand of death was RIGHT THERE ... and now it's gone. I tighten my grip on her and tug her toward me ... I think it's my arms around her that finally lets the truth sink in. "It's benign," I whisper against her hair.

That's a beautiful word. Simply beautiful. It may be the most glorious word in the English language.

In that moment, I understand just how scared Erica has been. I feel like her entire weight is on my shoulder when she sags against me and when she sobs ... my eyes meet Addison's and she reaches down, plucking my bag from my hand. I watch her walk behind a pillar, the kind where serial killers lurk to watch for their next victim and I think maybe I've gone a little crazy because the mental image of Mark walking past her and meeting his fate makes me smile. She'd beat him to death with my box of candy, I think. Or at the very least make him wish she had.

I'm weightless as I cling to Erica and when I think of the fact that she's OKAY, that we're OKAY, and that the scariest aspects of our future are my mother and a homophobic vandal ... I love life. Hers. Mine. Ours. I start to laugh the same way she did in the car earlier. It takes me less than ten seconds to realize that my laughter is choked with sobs. I suddenly understand what my mother means when she says that someone doesn't know whether to shit or go blind. That's me. I don't know what to do with myself. Breaking out of chains never felt so good. This is the acquittal that you wait a lifetime for and even though it's only been a few days since I started carrying worry around like a second skin ... the relief feels like a million years in the making.

"It's okay, Yellow." I rub her back, kiss her neck. "Now I can yell at you for trying to hide this from me at first."

"Don't," she replies, clutching me so tight it hurts. "I'm all right. I - I'm okay."

There's childlike wonder in her voice. "Yeah."

"Oh ... God," she whispers. "I didn't want to be sick -"

"I know."

"But mostly ... I didn't want to leave you. I - I'm sure I promised you forever and I'd never break a promise to you." She lifts her head from my shoulder and looks me in the eye. "I love you."

"I love you, too."

She cries again and I cry with her ... thinking that tears have never felt so damn good in my life.

"What the hell happened now?!"

I turn and look at Mark, who is standing a few feet behind us. He's carrying a bouquet of red roses and apparently his voice carries because Addison peers around the pillar and narrows her eyes. Before I can reply, she stalks forward and says, "What are you doing here? I'm pretty sure no one here wants to see you."

He holds the flowers out toward her, but he's still looking at me. "Why are you crying? Shit, Callie, your arm is bleeding. I told you to keep it covered!"

"Huh?" I ask, dumbly glancing at my shorts.

"Damn it," Erica says, looking down at my shoulder, which she rested her head against. "I did it."

Addison takes the flowers that he has thrust so haphazardly in her direction and Mark lifts my arm, eyeing the blisters that are weeping right along with me. "I've got a first aid kit in the car," he tells me. He glances at Erica's tear stained face again then does a double take on Addison. "Holy hell. What happened to your hair?"

I watch her hand go to her hair and then there's a flurry of rose petals as she swings. She beats him about the head and shoulders with the flowers, making the buds fall off and scatter around our feet. I can't even count how many licks she gets in, but it's quite a few. It's enough. Mark raises his hands over his head, howling his outrage, but the damage is done. He looks like he's gone twelve rounds with a rabid cat by the time she's done with him. All that remains of the roses are twelve thorny stems when she throws them at him and stalks off. I've never heard anyone call anybody the names that she shouts over her shoulder and the venom dripping from her is enough to stun me ... and that takes a lot. It's brutal. And he's paying for the assault dearly. His face is as crimson as the blood that leaks from his various scrapes.

With his hair standing on end, Mark looks at me with abject horror. "What did I say?"

"Seriously?" I ask. "You don't know what you did?"

"I gave her flowers! What the fuck was I thinking? Clearly that was an invitation to be a crazy bitch!"

"You insulted her!" I snap. "Honestly! Mark, you don't ask a woman what happened to her hair."

"And you don't preface that question with 'holy hell', either," Erica advices. "That's just rude."

"I was rude?" Genuinely shocked, he plucks a rose petal out of his hair. "Damn."

Erica's blue eyes are huge and dry as she appraises him. "This?" she tells no one in particular. "Is why I'm gay. Straight drama is insane."

I reach out and pat him on the arm. "What you should have said ... is that you liked her hair. And you should have looked at her when you gave her the flowers so she knew you meant it."

"You were BLEEDING. I stop blood flow first and then ... try to romance people," he growls. "And I'm not sure if I like her hair. It's ... red."

"It's supposed to be!" I tell him. "She's Addison."

"Well, I was used to it the other way. Why the hell do women change everything right when you get used to them?!" He rubs his cheek and hisses, then looks down at his arms, where the zig zag patterns are seeping blood. "Look at this mess. At least her hair matches her damn temper now!"

"You really need to work on your people skills," Erica tells him, sniffling as she rubs the tears off her face. "What a day."

He looks like he wants to shove the rose stems up her ass for a split second, but then he takes in the mascara on her cheeks and the flaring in his nostrils evaporates as quickly as it came on. "What were the two of you ... upset about ... when I walked up?"

"I don't have cancer," she tells him. "I'm okay."

He throws his hands in the air. "Women! Give one flowers and she kicks your ass. Give another good news and she cries. I need a dog or something. A male dog. Something big and ..."

"Manly?" I offer. "I don't think the Archfield would approve, but if you chose to man up and get your girl ... no one would complain. Well, except maybe the neighbors."

He makes a face at me and points at my shoulder. "You want my first aid kit?"

"You need it more than me," I reply. "Besides, my mother keeps one in her suitcase. I'm fine."

"Good luck with that," he tells me, bending down and gathering the stems, which he throws into the trash. When he gets to his feet again, he says, "What would happen if I went to her room and asked her to help me out with antibiotic cream?"

Erica shakes her head. "Dude, that's asking for it. She may throw you out the window."

"And the Neosporin may go up your ass first," I add.

"Hmm, I see your point."

The clicking of high heels alerts me that someone is approaching, but it's Mark's reaction that tells me who it is before I turn to look. Addison has come back and judging by his face, he's not happy to see her. When I glance behind me, I can see why he's hesitant. She's carrying a big bottle of rubbing alcohol. I watch her screw the lid off and toss it aside and Mark has the audacity to run behind me. Erica shoves him away and we dart behind a BMW when Addison slashes the air with the bottle, sending a spray dead onto the arms that Mark has lifted in surrender. He hops up and down, trying in vain to shake the antiseptic off his wounds, but he only succeeds in rubbing it in. I had a similar encounter with a hot pepper once ... and rubbed my eyes after nearly choking to death. It wasn't pretty. My reaction was the same as Mark's now. If there isn't rain in the forecast ... the rain dance he does right now will surely cause a downpour.

He lunges for the bottle of alcohol and she lets another stream fly. "YOU ARE AN ASSHOLE, SLOAN!"

"Addison, stop!" he yells, swerving like a linebacker to keep her from wetting him again. "You're fucking insane! Do you hear me!? You went to California and drank the Kool-Aid. I told you -"

"STOP TALKING!" she cries. "I got my hair done for you! I thought it would remind you of old times!"

"I don't remember it ever being so ... loud." He hums a tune. It's a boisterous carnival ditty and I gasp, bracing for carnage. "Send in the clown cars!"

"Ooooh! I'm gonna kill you!" Another good dousing sees him putting a Mercedes between them. She stalks forward, looking every bit the She-devil. The overhead lights make her hair look like a blazing halo around her head. It's bouncy and I begrudgingly admit to myself that Helen styled it beautifully. The cunt. It'll look great for the mug shot anyway. "I don't know what I ever saw in you!" Addy yells at Mark. "You've got the emotional maturity of a seventeen year old boy and you're not that great in bed anyway!"

"Yeah, right," he laughs. "That's why you're begging for it, huh?"

The bottle bounces off his head and she yanks her heel off, shaking it at him. "I don't have to beg. I was merely offering ... to see if you've learned anything since I've been gone. You know, like where the clitoris is, fumble fingers."

"Well, if you'd prune the hedges maybe the fucker wouldn't be hidden in the jungle. Step into this century, Addison, buy a razor! Get a wax!" he shouts. "Or leave it and show it to your hairdresser so that she can get a little closer to the natural color instead of ultraviolet!"

Oh.

My.

God.

She throws her shoe like a pitcher during the world series .. hiking one leg out and up toward her chest. I don't think Manolo Blahnik ever intended his shoes to be used as missiles, but they apparently work well as one. Mark clutches his throat, where the sharp, pointy tip hit him and leans over, wheezing. I start to rush forward, but Erica clutches me around the waist and shakes her head. "Wait."

"MARK!" Addison stumbles around the front of the car that is separating her from her target, one shoe on, one shoe off. She clutches at his broad shoulders, trying to pull him upright. "Are you okay?"

I gasp when he grabs her, lifting her over his shoulder. He slaps her twice, hard, on the ass as her head dangles near his backside and it's like watching some weird mating dance on The Discovery Channel. I can almost hear some British guy saying, 'After the bloodletting struggle for dominance, the male homosapien lifts his mate over his shoulder and retires with her to his twenty five hundred dollar per week man-cave, where he hopefully finds the her clitoris and lives to see another day'.

"PUT ME DOWN!" Addison screeches like a banshee, cutting through my mental documentary.

I cringe when I hear her slap him on the back and he retaliates in kind, swatting her a third and fourth time. On the fifth blow, his hand lingers on her backside and I can tell that he's molding the shape of her with his oversized palm. As far as foreplay goes ... it's brutally enticing. She stops fighting and hangs like a rag doll over his shoulder as he steps over her shoe and the alcohol bottle. As soon as she catches sight of her pricey high hell, however, she demands that he retrieve it. It's almost laughable ... since she's not really in a position to demand anything, but her voice is full of venom when she pounds on his shoulder. "Get it!"

"No," he snaps. "Leave it."

"PUT ME DOWN! NOW!" She strains upward, pulling his hair and he swats her for a sixth time, causing her to vocalize her outrage so colorfully that I wish I had a notepad to jot down a few key phrases.

When she yanks his hair again, he shoves her further over his shoulder, pretending to drop her onto her head.

Her scream is blood curdling.

And it summons the real She-devil.

My mother comes running around the corner, her short, chubby legs and Sketcher covered feet propelling her forward with far more speed than I've ever given her credit for. Her pepper spray is armed and at the ready, but instead of spraying Mark in the face with it, she sinks her foot into his groin and for a split second, I actually think that Addison is going to crack her head open because it looks like he's dropping her. Mark wheezes and falls to his knees, keeping a firm grip on Addison and gently setting her on her feet as he leans forward, his forehead against the asphalt. He truly is sputtering for air now and Erica and I race forward together. My mother, who apparently didn't realize that she was attacking someone she knows covers her mouth with both hands, looking stunned.

"MOM, WHAT THE HELL!?" I yell, dropping down beside him.

"I thought he was a rapist! There was a news story just now about ... oh my goodness ... oh my goodness," Mom babbles, her face scarlet. "Oh, Mark, honey ... are you okay?"

"Kill me. Now," Mark rasps. "Testicle ... retrieval ... surgery..."

Being wrong has never been okay with Lori Anne Torres. Instead of apologizing for possibly sterilizing him, she puts her hands on her ample hips and stomps her foot. "Well, for Heaven's sake, Mark! No wonder my daughter left you if this is how you treat women! Apologize to Addison right now! Look at the state of her! You're lucky it was me that saw it and not Santos because they'd be zipping you in a body bag if he had seen you manhandling her! Calliope, did he ever hit you?"

"No, Mom," I say and it's entirely possible that I'm more humiliated than she is. My family needs to be committed. We're a three ring circus act. "I cannot believe you did that."

"Well, what did you expect me to do!?" she demands. "I didn't pay a thousand dollars for self defense lessons just to sit idly while a woman gets attacked."

"Self defense!" Mark mumbles. "Self, Lori Anne. That means YOU ... not other people."

"Women stick together!" She points a finger at him. "Ass!"

"I love you," Addison tells her, hugging her. "Can I have your autograph?"

I roll my eyes when they embrace and tug on Mark's arm. "Can you get up?"

"I'm thinking never again. It'll be flaccid until the day I die," he deadpans. "Thanks for the memories, Cal. They'll have to do me."

"I'm sorry," I tell him. "Uh ... maybe you should ... put some ice on it?"

Erica helps me get him to his feet and he glares at me, then my mother, then at Addison. "Women!"

When he stalks away with what's left of his pride, which I'm sure is just as tattered as his arms (and balls), I retrieve my bag and watch Addison do the same with her shoe. My mother is pretending to be perfectly fine with wielding the foot of doom against a friend, but I can tell that she's shaken herself up just as much as she's shaken Mark. To take the attention off herself, she looks at me defiantly and says, "What are you doing here?"

"I wanted to stop and see Jazz," I reply. "And ... Dad."

"Oh, I see how it is. You don't have a mother anymore? Just because I have a different opinion?"

I put my hands on my ample hips, matching her pose. "Since when does a different opinion mean that you get to call me a whore?"

She takes a deep breath. "I apologize for that."

"Do you also apologize for calling me perverted and disgusting?"

"Your actions are." She continues talking before I can correct her. "To me ... it is perverted and disgusting. It's not only morally wrong, it's unnatural."

"So is dyeing your hair, but you still do that!"

Ever the diplomat, my mother puts a fake smile on her face, directing it at Addison. "Speaking of hair, honey, yours is quite lovely."

"Uh ... thanks?" Addison smoothes her rumpled shirt down, adding, "I'm gonna go ... to my room ... and ... plot Mark's demise. Erica, I'm happy that everything turned out okay." Leaning forward, she kisses my cheek and says, "Call me."

I watch her leave and I envy her the fact that Mark Sloan is her biggest problem. I've decided that my mother's scorn and derision is just as heavy as the cancer scare. It weighs on a different part of my heart, but it hurts just as much. I'm not really used to having Mom hate my life. When I married George, she disliked being excluded more than she disliked my new last name. She was just as bad as Sydney Heron at times ... going out of her way to call me Callie O'Malley while she cackled at her own joke like no one else had thought of it. The divorce was also something she despised and she let me know it, too. It took me giving up the goods on George's affair with Izzie to make her come around all the way and then I had to talk her out of killing him. I think if cooler heads had not prevailed ... she would have channeled the most notorious of serial killers and spread the pieces of George all over the United States.

I don't know how to tell her that she is hurting me more than he ever did.

Erica reaches down and takes my hand. She doesn't just take it, she threads her fingers through mine and says, "What room are you guys in, Lori Anne? Callie brought Jasper some candy."

Mom regards her for the first time since we've been here. "What did Addison mean? What turned out okay?"

"I don't have cancer." Erica says the words with authority, she says them with a vengeance. "Disappointed?"

"What!?" Scandalized at the suggestion, Mom stuns me by bursting into tears. "I'd never ... how could you think ... for Heaven's sake, Erica! I wouldn't have picked you for my daughter, but she did. I don't want to see her hurt."

"Oh, it's fine for Erica to hurt, but not me?" I thrust the bag of candy into my mother's arms and say, "Tell Dad to bring Jasper by to see me before you fly back home. Erica, let's go."

"Wait! Callie, I didn't say that! I didn't mean that!" Mom cries, tears still falling. "Honey, please!"

"NO!" I whirl on my heel and glare at her. "Erica and I got great news today and you're not going to ruin it. You're not. And preaching at me, telling me that you don't approve of my life ... the only thing that's going to change is your place in it! I love you. I love you with all my heart, but I don't want to see you again until you can accept me. And Erica is part of me. For good!"

"Okay ... okay, calm down." Mom adjusts the bag on her hip and reaches for me. "Your shoulder is bleeding."

"Yeah, well it's my heart that's hemorrhaging. You've broken it. I hope you're happy."

"I'm not." She takes a step forward and holds her hand out, palm up. It's the same way she used to gesture to me when I was a little kid and she wanted me to take her hand before crossing the street. When I don't make a move to accept the offer, Erica lifts my left hand and puts it in my mother's. I don't think Mom has noticed my ring until right now. She rubs her thumb over it, then sets the bag on the ground and takes Erica's left hand. She seems to be lost in thought for a moment as she studies our bands and I'm almost afraid of what she'll say. "These are beautiful."

"Thank you," Erica tells her and I watch her long fingers clench around my mother's like she's a lifeline and not someone hell bent on destroying us. "If you give me a chance ... I can prove that I'm the right person for her. Just ... give me a chance, Lori Anne. Please? I know I'm not who you wanted to see her with, but I can guarantee you that I'm going to take care of her. I love her just as much as you do."

Even though this is not new to me ... I still feel it all over. It's like stepping into a warm bath after being out in the freezing rain all day. When she says it ... I believe her and my mother would be a fool not to do the same. I'm firmly convinced that soul mates exist and I've found mine finally. Tangled up in love is the best possible way to be snared and I grin at her, despite the severity of the situation. She meets my eyes and smiles back at me, baring her teeth, baring her heart. "I love you, too," I tell her, leaning my head against hers. "So much."

My mother squeezes my hand and says, "Why don't you deliver Jasper's candy to him yourself? He was asking about the two of you earlier."

"Okay," I reply, still gazing at Erica. I'm sure I look like a lovesick puppy, but I don't care.

She pushes my hair back and kisses my forehead, then turns her attention back to Mom, who is still holding our hands. "By the way, I approve of your self defense classes. Your aim was incredible. I've been tempted to do the same thing to him quite a few times."

"What was he doing to her?" Mom asks, letting our hands go. "She was furious."

"That was foreplay." I shrug my shoulders.

Mom is bending to retrieve the bag, but stops, looking up at me. "It's Seattle. It has to be Seattle. I told you that the West Coast was full of freaks and crazies. If that was foreplay, I'd hate to see actual ... copulation."

"No one calls it that."

"Hell, I guess not. That's far too nice a word for whatever ... that ... was."

Erica hugs me as we wait for the elevator.

As much as I'd rather be making love with her to celebrate the test results ... we need to make this step with my mother.

Jasper is so excited to see us that he wets his pants.

Buddha nearly tears Erica's pinky toe off and my Dad models the shirt that I bought him with such a ridiculous amount of posturing that I nearly pee my pants.

My mother stands on the outside ... looking in.

I pray that she sees what I've seen all along.

There really is no one better for me than Erica Hahn.

By the time we get home, we're both so eager to celebrate our benign good fortune that we're barely parked in the garage before my hands are under her shirt. She simply lets her car seat fall back and we make really, really great use of my Infiniti. After a lengthy make out session, we go inside, eat far too much ice cream, and then submerge ourselves in the hot tub. It's not dark out yet, but neither of us care. I move over her in the water, locking my legs around her waist as she slides her hands over my ass. I automatically grind forward, into her. It's so bizarre that I can get so much ... out of so little.

I tug her earlobe with my teeth and smile down at her. "Life is good."

"Life is very, very good," she agrees, easing one hand around me. Her eyes stay on my face as two of her fingers seek and earn entrance. The water isn't hot by any stretch of the imagination, but it's engulfing me ... she's engulfing me. I boil with lust every single time she touches me this way. "So are you."

I capture her mouth with mine and seal everything that doesn't need to be said with a kiss.

We're still in the water two hours later and I break her record of orgasms.

Giving is still just as much fun as receiving with her.

"OH MY GOD, YOU'RE BACK!"

I brace myself when Lexie launches herself at me. She's doing rounds with Cristina and I let her hug me, laughing because Yang acts like she wants to vomit at the public display of affection. When Lexie steps away ... Cristina pokes me in the arm and that's as close to a hug as she'll give me, but it's just as warm. It only takes five minutes for Lexie's mile a minute update on everything I've missed (which really isn't anything) to grate on my nerves and I breathe a sigh of relief when Cristina tells her to go fetch labs. I accompany my ex-roommate to the lounge where we both pour steaming cups of coffee and enjoy it on the breezeway, watching our co-workers mill around below us.

"So, Stevens is pregnant." Cristina watches me closely for a reaction and she's disappointed when I'm not surprised. "Mini Grey already told you, huh? There's a bedpan with her name on it."

"She did spill the beans."

"You will never, ever believe who the father is."

"George?"

"Dr. Savoy."

Scalding hot coffee up the nose is never, ever pleasant. I see a star burst of color as it singes my nasal cavity and choke on it. "WHAT!?"

"Yep." She makes a face, watching me try to recuperate with as much dignity as I can muster. "It will have nice, good looking genes, but so many fucked up chemicals in the brain that it won't have a snowball's chance in hell of being normal."

"Holy shit."

"There's nothing holy about those two." She sighs. "So, Burke is apparently coming back to visit."

"Holy shit!" I repeat, not just for Cristina, but for Erica, who won't enjoy seeing Preston again. Oh, how I hope we're out the country by then.

"There's nothing holy about that either. I plan on kicking his ass just as hard as Addison kicked Mark's this morning."

"This morning?" I ask, thinking about the beat down the previous day. Addison called me not long after Erica and I returned home from visiting my parents to tell me that she was ignoring all of Mark's calls. And apparently the calls were numerous. He interrupted our fifteen minute talk no less than five times."They're still at it?"

"Still? You mean today wasn't their first round? I knew some of his wounds looked less than fresh. Damn. I miss everything."

"What happened?"

"They were in the parking lot when I came in. She was chasing him around her car and he laughed at her, but I think her purse must have been really heavy when it connected because he didn't laugh again. It sounded like there was lead in it."

"Jesus."

She nods at me. "So, I didn't think that you and Hahn were on the schedule yet."

"We're not. We decided to come in for the M&M so we could let Richard know that we're ready to come back whenever he wants us. We're going to Italy in a few weeks. I need to cut something before then or I'll go crazy."

"I heard about the biopsy. And the results. I drank a beer last night for Hahn ... to celebrate." She takes a step closer. "And then I celebrated with that cute new X-ray technician."

"The guy with the curls?" I ask and when she nods, I slap her on the arm. "Go, Yang! He's pretty cute."

"And hung like a horse. Seriously. It hurt so good."

"Nice."

Smiling, she lifts my hand and checks my watch. "And I have an on call room appointment to go there again before the M&M. See you there."

I watch her go and sip my coffee, leaning against the breezeway railing. Mark spots me and waves, taking the stairs two at a time to join me. I can tell by his determined stride that he has something on his mind so I brace myself for his wrath. He looks like hell. I can tell that he hasn't slept because he wore the same expression while I was practically comatose on Cristina's sofa in deep, mental depression and then again after my surgery. I can't believe I ever underestimated him and dismissed him as nothing more than eye candy and an easy lay. He takes my cup and drains the bitter liquid inside, grimacing as he does so.

"What's wrong, Sloan? Spill it."

"I think I pissed her off too much this time."

"What did you do?"

"That's just it ... I don't know. She won't talk to me and I tried to play it off this morning ... I tried to joke with her, but she won't talk to me. Not one word. And she was crying in the stairwell a while ago." He crumples the cup and squeezes it in his hands, which are still so scratched that he looks like a great candidate for a skin graft ... you know, if you took the skin from his ass and nothing that's exposed. I never knew that the thorns on a rose stem could do so much damage. He's lucky he still has both eyes. "What do I do, Cal?"

I'm stunned that he's asking me for advice ... the me that trampled his insides as much as Addison trampled his outsides ... but I'm also elated. "What do you want to do? Think about that before you answer."

He does. I can practically see the gears rotating in his head as he mulls his response. He turns to face me before he replies and I nervously bite my lip because he could easily tell me to fuck off, but he doesn't. "I want to love her again. I did before. I really did ... after Derek left. Hell, even before he left ... when I wasn't supposed to. I loved her, but she's Addison. She left me in New York after she aborted my kid and I still chased after her, hoping she would forgive me for not being him as much as I forgave her for not wanting to have a family with me. I even chased her to California, but she never knew that. You didn't even know that. It was right before your marriage ended. I flew down there and I watched her for an entire day ... trying to figure out if there was any part of her that still loved me. I let her go that day. I gave up.

"And now she's back and she claims that she wants me. If she had told me this months ago ... it would be fine, but now it's not. I changed. You came and went and if I couldn't be who you needed ... then how am I supposed to be who she needs?" His eyes are sad when they lock on mine. "I'm afraid of hurting her the same way you hurt me. I never knew what that felt like until you and I don't want to do that to her, but I'm still so god damned pissed at ... everyone ... I ... I don't know what to do and hurting her comes easy."

"Don't dwell on the fact that she left, Mark, because she came back. She came back for YOU and that matters. And you're not pissed at her ... you're not even pissed at me ... you're pissed at yourself because you can't NOT care. You didn't change as much as you think you did ... you simply let your guard down with me and everyone saw your tender underbelly." I reach out and take his hand, relieved when he doesn't pull back. "Let your guard down again. Anyone with eyes knows that you love her ... except her. Show her. Hold her hand in the hallway ... buy her ONE flower ... put a note in her locker ... and don't waste any more time."

He nods at me, then smiles. "I cannot believe I'm actively seeking relationship advice from the baby lesbian at the root of my emotional trauma."

"Yeah, well, I can't believe I'm so full of wisdom. I used to be a cynic, you know?"

"Do I ever." He nudges me with her shoulder. "I've missed you. A little."

"Liar. You've missed the hell out of me and I know it."

The megawatt smile, the one that should be patented as 'McSteamy' falls into place. Even amidst the road map of scratches on his face ... it's beautiful. "Yeah, you're onto me. I'll see you at the M&M."

I watch him walk away. There are moments in life where you want to break out into song.

This is one of those times.

But I refrain.

I hear Erica's familiar laugh and it makes me smile. She hasn't really stopped laughing since we got the news and that suits me just fine. I love that she's in love with her life and that I can be a part of it. Moving to the other side of the breezeway, I easily pick her out of the crowd of people. I could watch her all day, I think. One hand moves through her hair, flipping it back almost girlishly and I chuckle because it's like she has decided to relive her childhood. She's hugging a stuffed bear to her chest with one arm as she gestures with the other.

I'm tempted to text her and point out that her ass looks really nice from this angle, but I freeze when the person she's chatting with steps into view. Helen looks even more stunning today. Her long hair is falling to her waist with big curls and the skirt she's wearing would be indecent even by Miami's standards. I watch the woman rest her hand on Erica's shoulder and I can picture them in my head so clearly ... doing unmentionable things to one another, that I'd scald my hand if I was still holding my coffee cup. Erica laughs at something Helen says and I watch the group of guys standing near them do the same thing. Alex, George, and several interns are loitering to get an eye full and Helen seems to know that she's being admired because she keeps touching her hair, adjusting her skirt. I'd choke her with it if I could.

I leave the breezeway for the shelter of the bathroom, where I hide the way I did in high school ... when the pretty girls always won.

I think maybe Helen is my cancer.

"Are you okay?" Erica asks, giving me a quick hug as I sink into the seat next to her. "You look like you feel bad."

I shrug away when she tries to feel my forehead and pull away. "I'm fine."

"Are you sick?"

"You could say that."

Before she can reply, Addison flops down beside me and holds out a bag of Swedish Fish. "Want one?"

"No, thanks." I lean back as she offers Erica the candy and Erica accepts, casting me a sidelong look of worry.

"I did not miss this while I was in California. Hours of being told how much we suck." Addy chews on her candy and sighs. "I'm over dating, by the way. I mail ordered a purple pulsater last night. Give me pointers, oh toy goddess."

"Point and click," I reply. "And utilize the foot boards at the Archfield."

"Footboards?" She bites the head off a fish, clearly trying to visualize. "Come again?"

"Precisely," I tell her. "Use the footboard to ... uhm ... hold it in. You'll come again and again."

When she still looks vacant, I illustrate with my hands, showing her a pair of legs dangling over the footboard of the bed. Her imagination finally gets it ... finally gets the art that goes with making out with yourself by using the bed to make it a little better and her mouth forms an 'o'. "I see."

On the other side of me, Erica is watching me closely and I squirm uncomfortably, checking my watch. I'm saved from explaining my bad mood by the arrival of Mark. He plops down beside Addison and she gets up, moving to the other side of Erica. Like musical chairs, Mark takes the spot she vacated and mumbles, "What's your advice now?"

"Hang in there."

He yanks his phone out and rapidly texts. A moment later, Addison's phone vibrates and when she texts him back, I'm sure she's furious because she's gripping and pounding her phone hard enough to make the back fall off. It's my phone that responds when she finishes her tirade and I reluctantly take it from my pocket. It's Addison, naturally.

'Tell that scratched up piece of shit beside you to stop bothering me before I have him arrested for harassment. I'm moving on. He can kiss my ass.'

I nudge Mark with my elbow and hand him my phone. He reads it and I have to wrestle it from him when he draws back like he wants to throw it at her. I snatch it from him and stow it back in my pocket, but it doesn't stay long. Mark furiously types me a message and I shoot him a withering look as I retrieve it.

'Tell the Jungle Girl that I'll be happy to give the next guy a map through her rain forest. Poor schmuck will need it.'

I shake my head no at him, but Addison reaches across Erica and snatches my phone. I can tell she's read it because she blurts out, "Fucking asshole!"

Several heads turn our way and I'm grateful that the meeting starts because it's not going to be pretty otherwise.

As a rule, M&M's are not as fun as the candy. Morbidity and Mortality conferences are just as gloomy as the name implies because you listen to your peers discussing their mistakes, and sometimes you discuss your own, and it's a stark reminder that we're all just human. No matter how much we feel like super heroes when we pull a dying kid out of cement or trace the maze of a gunshot wound and stitch the damage, we make mistakes. People die on our watch. Something that presents as a common cold can chase a heartbeat down and bludgeon it to death before we know what happened. This is the reality of medicine. It's only medicine ... and it can't fight the Grim Reaper when he's persistent as hell. I try to pay attention, but I find myself reliving the morning with Erica before we left. She slept late so I cooked chocolate chip pancakes.

There's something to be said for licking syrup off someone's stomach to wake them up.

She certainly didn't mind.

And the fact that neither or us ate much (fuck, I can't cook! okay!?) is evidenced by the conversation our stomachs have, both rumbling in response to the other. Karev, who is sitting in front of me with half the vending machine in his lap, doesn't even turn around. He simply hands two bags of chips back to us and we take it. He snaps his fingers after I tear into my Sour Cream & Onion and I roll my eyes, pressing a ten dollar bill into his palm. The doctors who are brave enough to smuggle food in make a killing in resale. Sometimes it reminds me of a prison yard. I listen as much as I can to Webber discuss several errors that were made in a patient who was life-flighted in from Mount Rainier. Apparently the biggest problem is the fact that several residents did not answer their page immediately. When his eyes fall on the Five Fab Fools in front of me ... I feel excessively sorry for Bailey. She practically shrinks lower into her seat when he asks Meredith to explain the delay in response.

"Uh," Grey begins, nervously glancing to her left at Izzie. I should have known. "It was quite a day."

"I didn't ask you to tell me what kind of day it was, Dr. Grey. I've already proven that it was 'quite a day'. I'm asking you to tell me why, after four pages, the only people to meet the helicopter were two nurses and three techs." When she looks away, Richard says, "Dr. Karev?"

"I don't remember. I - I got there after she was in the trauma bay. I called it after close to an hour."

"I see. Dr. Yang, your memory is incredible What was the hold up?"

Someone clears his throat behind Richard and I groan when I see Savoy's hand in the air. He doesn't wait for permission to speak, however, and says, "I should think that it's obvious that Bailey's interns have now become Bailey's residents and no one holds them accountable. Especially her. These alleged doctors of hers will-"

"Alleged doctors?" Karev leans forward in his seat to scowl at Savoy. "This was my case and the last time I checked ... I earned my degree at the same place you did."

"Did they school you on answering your pager?" Savoy challenges. "Because I'm pretty sure that the five of you, Bailey's Blundering Babies, have caused more deaths than any other band of misfits in this hospital."

Alex makes a move toward him, but Mark stands up and intercepts before he can connect. I catch Savoy's eye and shake my head in disgust. He glares at me, and says, "What, freak?"

"I seem to recall you causing a death yourself. Tobey Elmhurst. Ring a bell? You were so busy trying to feel me up in the supply closet that you let him bleed to death. Didn't you get a six week vacation for that?"

Several people laugh and his snake eyes dart around the room. "That was -"

"Different? You ignored several pages that night, Savoy. I was there. I remember telling you something was wrong."

"The only thing wrong was you, carpet mun-"

Mark is already on his feet. I don't know whether it's the slur Savoy is trying to use or the pent up testosterone coursing through Mark's body from having his ass handed to him by Addison that does it ... but he throws the right hook to end all right hooks and Savoy hits the ground. Mark knocks him out cold and I'm still too stunned by the entire thing to move, even when most of our colleagues spring into action around us. Erica moves past me, helping Derek stabilize Savoy's head while someone else runs for a C-collar and stretcher. I watch Mark shake his hand and my brain switches on ... I grab it and prod the bones, checking for a fracture. It's already swelling like there's no tomorrow and I glance at Addison, "Could you get an ice pack?"

"For him?" She points at Mark. "Absolutely not. Let the idiot hurt."

"I was defending honor!" Mark growls, trying to yank his hand away from me. "Chicks are supposed to like that, Addison! You should be humping my leg right now!"

"You were defending her honor," Addison snaps, trying to hit him on the arm, but I stop her. "When you defend mine ... then I'll hump your leg."

"Your honor is in one piece," I tell her and she puts her hands on her hips, glaring at me. It prompts me to look at Mark and add, "Nevertheless, you shouldn't have done that. Webber is going to - here he comes. Heads up."

As I listen to the Chief demand that Mark report to his office after his hand is X-rayed, I'm all too aware that I'm standing between Mark and Addison. Literally and figuratively. I messed with his head so much that he can't rush into anything with her and she knows it. She's still trying to be friends with me while she watches him come to terms with whatever it is he wants from me now. He was looking at me when he gave her the roses. He was more concerned with the barely there blood on my shoulder than with her new hair. And now ... now he's put his ass on the line to knock out the guy who insulted me. If I were walking around in Addison's shoes ... I'd hate me. I'm stunned that she doesn't feel the same way about me as I feel about Stevens ... or Helen for that matter. I feel a little nervous when I look at her and say, "Why don't you take him to X-ray? I'll come and read the films when -"

"Why don't YOU take him to X-ray," she suggests. "He's your defender, isn't he? Ass!"

She leaves the M&M without a backward glance and I hear him sigh beside me.

We watch Savoy being loaded onto a stretcher ... listening as he mumbles something about the Tooth Fairy ... before heading for radiology.

Mark has no broken bones.

But I think maybe he's finally broken himself and the fact that he looks expectantly at the door every couple of seconds tells me that he wants a certain flaming redhead with a temper like Satan himself to put him back together.

It's only fitting that my period comes on with a vengeance after Mark lets me put an ace bandage on his hand. I do it more for show than anything else, thinking that Chief Webber may go lighter on him in the presence of a bandage. I've had cramps all morning, which I attributed to Helen's display of Super Model in front of Erica, but that's not the case. I finally recognize it for what it is and hurry into the bathroom, where my suspicions are confirmed. I don't have any cash on me for the tampon machine, naturally, and the thought of walking to my locker with a wad of toilet paper between my thighs is so Freshman year that I can't bring myself to do it. Not to mention the fact that the crotch of my white pants look like I've slaughtered something there. I sit patiently on the toilet and wait for someone to come in because this ... this is where every woman is your friend. You can bond in the bathroom over saving the day with a fresh roll of toilet tissue any day of the week. You can carry on whole conversations about the standard of cleanliness in a restroom with a complete stranger while you await your turn at catching E. Coli on the dirty commode. And you can ask any random woman who walks in for a tampon and if she has it ... she will probably hand it over. It's one of those things that women do ... we share the curse and the cure with a knowing looking of sympathy.

After five minutes of surfing the net on my Blackberry, I realize that I could call someone.

I'm pissed at Erica for the whole Helen thing. Addison is pissed at me and Mark really doesn't need to push his luck delivering girl products to the bathroom ... even though he's done it before.

I'm about to call Cristina when the door opens. Someone walks along the row of stalls and pauses in front of my closed door. "Callie?"

"Erica," I reply. She's wearing the shoes that she bought months ago because I told her they were cute on her. She hates them. I'm sure she does. I watch her wiggle her toes uncomfortably in them under the door.

"How's Mark?"

"Fine."

She taps her foot for a second. "Do you want to know how Savoy is?"

"Is he dead?"

"No."

"Then I don't care."

"You really shouldn't have gotten involved in that whole exchange. It had nothing to do with you."

"He was fucking with Bailey."

"Bailey is a big girl ... she can take care of herself."

"Whatever."

She rolls her left ankle around like it's hurting her. "Are you going to tell me what's wrong with you?"

I don't exactly want to tell her that seeing Helen anywhere in her vicinity can get my blood pressure going at an alarming rate because it shouldn't. It shouldn't bother me at all because Erica loves me. I should be glad that she's the kind of person who can remain friendly with her ex because I remain relatively friendly with mine, but it doesn't make it any easier. I also don't want to tell her that I'm bloated, crampy, ill, and having a hormonal mood swing because all that would be too easy and explain so much. I sometimes think my purpose in life is to complicate my existence as much as I possibly can. "No."

"Are you upset that your parents flew home today?"

"Not really."

"Will you please come out here?"

"I can't."

"Okay, fine ... I'll play along. Why can't you?"

I hear the door open and the steady tapping of heels on the tile. Addison says, "Is she in here?"

"Yep," Erica replies, moving to one side.

Addison's four inch heels join Erica's outside the door. "Callie?"

"What?"

"Is Mark okay?"

"Why don't you go ask him?"

"Because Richard is still yelling at him," Addison replies. "I'm sorry I snapped earlier. I just ... want to kill him with my bare hands and you were standing there so ... I'm sorry."

"Nothing says I'm sorry like a tampon," I tell her.

"Oh! Did you get your period?" she asks.

"No, Addison, I want to play with it!"

"Ooooh, I had forgotten how you do not handle PMS well." Addison's heels click and I hear the machine in the corner dispense its bounty. She holds it under the door a second later and I accept it. "If you really, really want to help me out, Addy, you could raid my locker for clean pants."

"Still the same one?" she asks. "Lucky thirteen?"

"Yep."

"Same combination?"

"Yeah."

"I'll be right back."

When she leaves, Erica clears her throat. "Is there a reason why you didn't ask me to help you out?"

"I'm pissed at you," I finally confess. Telling the person you love that you're mad as hell through a bathroom door while you try to staunch the flow of blood with a cardboard applicator is just as uncomfortable as it sounds. She doesn't reply for a long time. "Erica?"

"Helen was here earlier. Is that what this is about?"

"Oh my god! You get a gold star and a cookie."

"Okay, first of all, your attitude pretty much sucks and I don't appreciate it. Second, I'm going to remind you YET AGAIN that I don't say a single thing to you for talking to Mark."

"You don't have anything to worry about with Mark! I left him for you."

"I left Helen for you."

"I thought you weren't with her."

"This conversation is getting really, really old." I hear her stalk across the floor and I think she's leaving me alone, then she comes back. "You don't have anything to worry about either, just for the record. And she was here because her boyfriend is passing a kidney stone. They were on their way to breakfast when he got sick and Seattle Grace was closest."

"Oh."

"Oh," she mimics. "Happy now?"

"As happy as anyone who is stuck on the toilet can possibly be."

The minutes tick by painfully slow. I'm tempted to call Addison when the door finally opens and she apologizes breathlessly, telling us that she was waylaid by Mark, who has a two week unpaid vacation. She holds a pair of jeans over the stall door and I get dressed, listening to her prattle about Savoy, who blew out of the hospital like a madman when he heard that Mark hadn't been fired. Her pager sounds as I'm slipping my shoes on and I emerge in time to see her leave. Erica holds up a small bag and I put my dirty pants in it, then wash my hands. She leans against the sink, watching me out of the corner of her eye. "You really don't suffer your period well."

"Yeah, well, I have to pack five days of suffering into three. It's an even trade."

She grins at me. "Even though you do not deserve it ... I will happily buy you chocolate ice cream if you give me a kiss."

I toss the paper towel into the trash and raise a brow. "Where do you want me to kiss you?"

"You are bad." Leaning forward, she cups my face and gazes into my eyes for a few seconds before she kisses me. "But you will definitely be kissing me all over when we get home to make up for this little ... exchange."

We head back through the hospital, hand in hand. Our co-workers no longer notice and the few patients who do never say anything. It's become a non issue and the exact opposite of everything I mentally prepared myself for. At the beginning of our relationship, I was terrified of what would happen if I was too comfortable with her, too ready to hang onto her in public view, but now it's second nature. I'm not even doing it to make a statement or to challenge anyone ... I do it because I don't know how to be around her and not touch her. I do it because I'm proud of us and what we share ... even when I'm jealous or she's jealous or we've just had a semi-fight. I do it ... because I went for months imagining what it would be like, groping nothing but a memory and nothing but a dream, and now I've got it.

Webber spots us as we're about to board the elevator and rides it down to the lobby with us. To my surprise, he doesn't mention what transpired with Mark and Savoy. Instead, he gives us a schedule for the next three weeks and I see that plenty of thirty hour shifts in my future as we head up to our Italian getaway. Erica's schedule matches mine and it shouldn't have to because she's an attending and can pretty much set her own hours, but Richard gets it ... he gets that someone vandalized our house while we were sleeping inside it and he'd rather adjust her schedule than leave one of us home alone. He tells us he'll see us the following day and we cross the lobby together.

"I'm really glad you got two cats, baby," she says, stowing both of our schedules in her purse. "At least they can keep each other company while we work ourselves to death."

"The cats!" I cry, drawing to a halt. "What are we going to do with them while we're in Italy?"

"I've taken care of it."

"We can't board them! Ruma hates being in a crate. And Feo gets separation anxiety when he can't see him. They'll separate them. I know they will."

"Addison agreed to house sit. She's gonna stay at our place."

"Alone?! She can't be out there alone when -"

"You're going to ask Mark to house sit." Erica pats me on the arm. "They'll both show up and we'll pretend to be shocked and stunned and then you'll tell Mark that Addison shouldn't stay there alone and I'll tell Addison that I'm not comfortable leaving Mark in charge of our cats because he's an idiot and ... they'll stay together. You and I never had this conversation."

"That ... that's diabolical."

"Yes, I know." She puts her arm around me. "We'll stock the kitchen with plenty of alcohol and lots of romantic foods. They'll be together by the time we get back."

"Or, you know, everything will be destroyed."

"Well, I asked her before I saw her violent streak."

It's raining and the smell of it is wonderful in the parking deck. It masks the exhaust fumes beautifully, smelling crisp and clean. I pull her toward the low concrete wall and we watch the downpour for a while. She's the only other person I know who can enjoy nature's beauty as much as a summer blockbuster. I used to love watching storms in Miami, even though my mother would frantically pull me back in the house the second lightning streaked across the horizon. According to Mom, she was hit in the ass by a bolt of lightning as a teenager while she stretched out on her stomach in front of a wood burning heater. My father likes to tell her that a piece of wood flew out and struck her and that lightning wouldn't dare encroach upon her derriere, but she insists that it did and because of that ... she's terrified by it. I have to grin when I think of her flying home in the rain. I'm sure my father is as scratched as Mark is.

"I'm starving," Erica finally says, tugging on my hand. "We haven't split a Big Mac in a while."

"Damn ... first Pop Tarts and now Big Macs." I put my hand over my heart in shock. "Are you coming down with something?"

"'I've got a bad case of loving you'", she sings, doing a crazy little dance that nearly makes me pee my pants. This is what every relationship should be like. After you weather the storm ... you stop to enjoy the rain because you know it's going to make you grow even more.

We head toward her car, which won the morning coin toss on which vehicle to take, and I know that something is wrong when I see Mark standing beside it.

He hears us approaching and turns around, looking miserable. "Callie -"

"What?"

He takes a step back and I see that both tires on the passenger side have been flattened. The mirror is also hanging by a thread. It's not as bad as Red Rover, but it's bad enough.

And Erica is looking at him like he is the guilty party.


	22. Chapter 22

A different police officer responds to the latest incident.

It's the same drill. He walks around the car and grunts a few times as he takes photographs.

He also flirts with me. It's open, obvious, and overdone. He comments on my hair, my smile (which I'm pretty sure hasn't surfaced at all), and then asks me if I'm married. I politely tell him no, but assure him that I'm happily involved. Erica is the one that tells him we're a couple and that the crime is motivated by that. When he looks at me again ... it's an ugly, salivating kind of appraisal that makes me feel like my clothing vanished and he's waiting for me to gyrate so he can hold out a dollar bill. I hate it. It makes me feel filthy. Some men greet the news that a woman is into another woman with a knowing smile ... and some men, like this one, strip you to the skin with his eyes so that he can picture it in his head. When he licks his lips, I go and stand with Mark who pats me on the back.

To my shock and aggravation, Erica refuses to accept Mark's offer of a ride home. It clearly hurts his feelings and I can understand why ... because we were all doing so well and he's trying to step up and help. We had crossed a bridge that kept bucking us off it, but now it's like we're back at square one and I don't know why. The only thing missing is the name calling and I'm pretty sure the only thing that stops Erica from calling him a few choice words is the presence of the officer. When she makes it clear that Mark is not welcome, he tells me that he's sorry about the damage and offers to let me drive his car, taking himself out of the equation entirely. I start to accept, but Erica flips her phone open and pointedly calls a cab. To say I'm infuriated is putting it mildly. I see what she's thinking. She doesn't have to accuse him of being the culprit outright to make it clear that she suspects it. Mark valiantly hangs around until the wrecker arrives and then he squeezes my hand, telling me to be careful. I watch him drive away and cross my arms over my chest as Erica signs the paperwork. I have to cross them to keep from shaking her.

In the cab, she sits as far away from me as possible and that's fine with me. I know that Erica has a habit of forgetting what being tactful is all about, but it's the first time in a long time that has unnerved me with how rude she can actually be. I've been on the receiving end of it a handful of times and it was enough to make me never want to go back to that. Watching her put Cristina down, snap at interns, belittle people ... it was never easy for me ... because that's not a side of her that I see when we're alone. It's definitely not the part of her that I fell in love with. I've always dismissed it as a defense mechanism, but I refuse to excuse it now. There's no way in Hell that Mark Sloan spray painted my car ... much less gutted a deer on our front porch. Yes, he was pissed and aggressive for a while and he probably didn't shed a tear over my car being demolished, but I know in my soul ... with everything that I am ... that he couldn't hurt me that way.

The cab smells like underarm and I can't roll the window down because of the rain. I sigh and clear my throat, addressing the driver. "Sir, can you crank the air up a notch?"

"Yes, ma'am." He does as I request and smiles at me in the rearview mirror. "You don't remember me, do you?"

I shake my head apologetically. "No, I'm sorry."

"It's the beard," he replies, scratching his chin. "I bought you a drink at The Alibi Room."

"Must've been a long time ago. I haven't been there in over a year." He's looking at me again so I smile politely. "I said thanks, right?"

"Not really," he chuckles. "You went home with the bouncer. Not me. I wasn't muscle bound enough for you, I guess. You must be the type of chick who digs the jock type."

"Excuse me," Erica says, her tone harsh. "Can you drive and not talk?"

"Whatever, lady."

I can feel my ears flaming bright red and when my phone vibrates, I scramble for it. It's my father, letting me know that the flight was uneventful and everyone's safe. Jasper, he says, went straight into the ocean and Buddha followed. I text back, telling him that I miss them all too much for words. I drop my Blackberry back into my purse and notice that Erica's attention is focused solely on me. "What?"

"Was that your boyfriend?"

"It was my Dad, Erica."

"You're such a fucking hypocrite."

"Excuse me?!"

"I can't even talk to Helen without you raking me over the coals, but it's fine for to let Sloan fawn all over you. Did it ever occur to you that he's vandalizing our lives so that he can play the hero? He's your knight in shining armor ... always coming to the rescue, isn't he?" She narrows her eyes. "I think you like coming between him and Addison. You like that he's torn, that he keeps putting you ahead of her."

"You have lost your mind!"

"No, you've lost yours if you think I don't notice."

"Are you trying to pick a fight with me? Because you're doing a great job!"

"You think you're the only one entitled to be a fucking bitch all the time?"

"Did you just call me a bitch!?"

"I think I said fucking bitch."

Really ... nothing in the world could have shocked me more than that. She has playfully called me that word ... and maybe not so playfully when we're going at it in bed, but she's never said it in anger. I've never felt it like a slap until right now. "Don't talk to me!" I feel four years old when I say it ... hell, even before I say it, but I still blurt it out like a child.

"With pleasure," she growls, full of venom.

I try to think of ways to dismiss her attitude to no avail. I don't deserve it. Even though I am slightly hypocritical for falling apart every time I think of Helen ... she doesn't need to tell me that ... especially in front of a dirty looking cab driver like we're in an episode of 'Taxi Cab Confessions'. And not when he thinks he knows me. We should be stuck together like glue because of the latest attack, but we're not. I feel like Mark has become the wedge in my relationship the same way I'm the wedge in his. He may as well be sitting between us in the backseat because we can't reach around him. Actually, I could, but she's not attempting to and if she won't meet me halfway then I'm not going to run by myself.

To say I'm stunned is putting it mildly.

I'm actually floored by her outburst.

"It makes sense and you know it!" she snaps suddenly, causing me to jump. "He has the motive."

"Mark is a lot of things, but vandal isn't one of them."

"Stop defending him!"

"Stop accusing him!"

"I'm surprised you didn't call him to rescue you in the bathroom. He could have ripped the tampon machine off the wall for you."

"I only needed one, thank you very much. Although I can think of a few places to shove the whole machine right about now."

"I'd like to see you try."

"I'd have to pull your head out first."

"Ooooh," she says. "Aren't you just clever?"

I can feel my blood pressure steadily rising and it's never a good thing to be in my vicinity when that happens. "We should talk about this at home!"

"Let's not talk at all."

"I think I suggested that already! Thanks for catching up, Erica!"

She doesn't have a ready comeback. I catch the cab driver looking at me and say, "Can you turn the radio on?"

"No," Erica tells him. "I don't want to hear any racket."

"Then stop running your mouth!" I growl viciously. "That's plenty of racket if you ask me."

"YOU SAW HIM STANDING THERE, CALLIE! HOW CAN YOU ACT LIKE HE'S NOT THE PRIME SUSPECT!?"

"HELEN WAS AT THE HOSPITAL TODAY, TOO! WHO'S TO SAY SHE DIDN'T DO IT!?"

She opens her mouth to say something ... then seems to consider my words. She looks thoughtful, then shakes her head. "No, she wouldn't do that."

"Neither would Mark! Mark, Erica! The same Mark that you want me to invite to house sit! The same Mark who came to our house when YOU called him to check my burns. You know he wouldn't do it."

"No, I don't know that."

"Oh my! The infallible Erica Hahn just admitted she doesn't know something! Stop the presses!"

"Go to HELL!"

"FINE!"

I guess the honeymoon phase is over. We've argued, but now it's going someplace new and awful. To prevent it from escalating any further, I take full advantage of the red light and climb out of the car.

She doesn't call my name.

Or follow.

After walking seven blocks in the rain I make the startling discovery that I left my purse in the cab. That pretty much means that I am penniless, without a phone, and sadly at the mercy of the storm. That's a horrible word ... mercy. Humans are always at someone or something's mercy. We're always being convicted and then straining towards clemency to absolve us of our alleged transgressions, begging for mercy. Merciful surgeons to heal and correct, merciful laws to do away with the unjust, and mercy for our souls when it's time to draw our last breath. Mercy. I'm not feeling one ounce of mercy for Erica right now. I'm mad as hell.

And I still don't know what the hell happened.

How did we go from talking about splitting a Big Mac to screaming at each other?

Halfway down the ninth block ... I stop walking.

Whoever vandalized Erica's car has gotten what they wanted. The stress of the whole fucking thing has manifested itself in anger. At each other.

God, I hate losing.

I look and feel like a drowned rat by the time I make it the two miles to Mark's apartment building. It's the only place I can think to go and I try to look pleasant so the door man will let me in without a fuss. He remembers my name and does just that, ushering me into the warm, dry building like he's opening the Holy Gates. I get a couple of dirty looks from riders on the elevator as I drip all over the floor and I'm in a little bit of a daze when I knock on Mark's door. He answers immediately, making me feel like he's expecting someone. His eyes move over me and he shakes his head, chuckling. "You're a mess."

"No shit, Sherlock. Can I come in?"

"I just bought a new rug. You'll fuck it up."

"Mark!"

He steps aside, making a sweeping gesture. I bypass him with a scowl and go straight for the hallway, where the towels are kept. I pluck two from the neatly folded stack and head for the bathroom. He hasn't followed me and I hurry for the shower ... which, truthfully ... could possibly be something I miss about his place. It has a rainfall effect, back massagers, and more bells and whistles than any shower I've ever been in before. It's amazing. I stand under the hot water and when I emerge, I wrap myself in a towel and stalk to the laundry room, where I throw my clothing in the dryer. He's still in the living room when I stalk into his bedroom and dig a pair of his sweats and a t-shirt from his bureau. I slip it on and dry my hair, then help myself to a beer in his refrigerator before I flop down on the sofa and glance at the television.

Mark is watching porn.

He's openly, utterly, and absolutely watching porn.

And he's fucking riveted, like watching a woman bounce up and down on top of her mate while her big, silicone breasts don't move is the most natural thing in the world. I'm sure he watches it for the story line only. I reach over and take the remote from him, pausing it. He keeps looking at the screen, at the open mouthed woman with slightly lopsided nipples, and I clear my throat. "Erica thinks you vandalized her car. And mine. And our house."

"I know. She made that painfully clear." He looks at me, his eyes moving over his clothing on me. "Just help yourself to my shit, Callie."

"I did. Thanks." I drain half the bottle, still watching him. "Tell me you didn't do it. Tell me that I'm right. Tell me that you haven't forgotten that we were friends, great friends, and you wouldn't do that to me. Because I need to hear you say it."

He keeps his eyes on mine. "I would never ... under any circumstances ... do that to you. Or to Erica. It wasn't me."

"Okay."

"Tell me that you already knew that."

"Why the hell do you think I'm here ... and walking in the rain? Erica is pissed at me for defending you."

"I'm sorry," he tells me and it sounds genuine. "I guess I gave her plenty of reasons to believe I'd do it."

I finish off the beer and get up to retrieve another one. I bring one back for him as well and he hasn't started the movie again. He simply gazes at the screen. He thanks me when I hand him the bottle and sit down on the sofa again. "How's your hand?"

"Fine." He grimaces when he opens the bottle, however. "This girl in the movie ... she wants me to fix her breasts."

"Someone needs to," I reply, glancing back at the lopsided actress. "She's a hot mess."

"I could probably teach her what a real orgasm is, too."

I wrinkle my nose. "Better use a body condom. She's kinda skank."

He grins at me. "I said I could. I didn't say I would."

"What are you going to do about Addison?" I relax comfortably against the sofa. It's odd that I'm more comfortable in this apartment NOW than I ever was when I lived here. The only times I ever sank into the leather sofa and settled in were the nights that Mark worked and Erica stopped by to visit. It was during those times ... that I had a home. And it was only because she was there. I want to call her. I want to apologize ... even though I'm not entirely sure what I did to piss her off. I need to hear her voice all the same ... because I'm terrified that whatever it is that I don't know I'm guilty of ... will be too much for us to move past.

"I asked her to stop by for dinner."

It takes me a second to be pulled back into the conversation. My mind is firmly elsewhere. "You're cooking?"

"I'm dialing. Places deliver."

"Did she say yes?"

"She hasn't replied to the text yet."

"YOU TEXTED HER FOR DINNER!?"

"What? It's a valid form of communication!"

"It is NOT. Not when it matters. Call her."

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm trying to prove something here."

"That you're a heartless asshole!?"

"No. That she wants me. That she wants me even when she's pissed as hell at me."

"You're warped."

"I know." He peels the label on his beer and belches. It's loud. "'Scuse me."

"No problem."

He turns the DVD player off and we watch the news, drinking our beers in silence until the dryer goes off. My clothes are still damp, but not unbearable when I pull them back on. I neatly fold the clothing of his that I borrowed and leave them on the washer, then head back into the living room. "Does the offer still stand to let me borrow your car?"

"You've been drinking. I'll give you cab fare, but you're not driving my car."

"Shit."

"And saying 'shit' won't change my mind." He takes out his wallet and holds up some cash. When I reach for it, he pulls it out of my reach and says, "Are you going home?"

"That is the question, isn't it?"

"Was it that bad?"

"Yeah," I admit. "To me, it was. She's never been so pissed at me."

His cell rings and he glances down at the number, a frown creasing his face. "Speak of the devil." He doesn't answer, he simply holds it out to me.

Her name is 'Attila the Hahn' in his phone and I roll my eyes before I answer it. "Hello?"

I hear her breath on the other end of the line. I don't know whether she's inhaling or exhaling, but I can hear the aggravation there. "I should have known."

"You obviously did know. You called, didn't you?"

"I really hoped that he would answer and tell me that he hadn't seen you."

"I'm sorry that you found me. I'm sorry that I'm not still wandering around in the storm."

"You're the one who jumped out of the car like an idiot."

"If you're going to insult me ... I'm hanging up."

"Are you spending the night with him or what?"

"Yeah, Erica. That's the plan. You're onto me. I'm so busted."

She snorts. "It wouldn't shock me."

"Can we stop this? Please?"

"Where at you?"

"I'm at Mark's place. Are you going to come and get me?"

"No. I don't think so."

My voice cracks when I speak again. "Why are you doing this? Why?"

"You want to know why?" she growls. "I'll tell you why! I'm tired of living a fucking double standard with you! You pitch a tantrum every single time Helen enters the picture and I have to reassure you, stroke your ego, and act like I'm guilty of something when I'm not. You don't have a fucking thing to be threatened about with her. She's a woman ... just like you. But me and Sloan?! We're as different as night and day. I can't compete with a man, Callie, and you keep making me feel like I need to!"

"I have never-"

"Yes ... you have! You fucking have and you don't want to see it!"

I can tell that she's crying now. I hear it and I cannot stand it. I wish she was in front of me so I could chase it away. "Erica-"

"I hate what you do to me," she says. "And I hate that I let you."

I hate that I don't have a single fucking clue what's going on in her head right now. I hate that she's making absolutely no sense. This entire argument has come out of left field and I don't know what to do with it. Except maybe prescribe some Xanax.

"Are you going to say something?" she asks.

"I don't know what to say. I don't know where this is coming from."

"My heart, Callie! You used to pay attention to it!"

She hangs up on me and I slump back on the couch, my head in my hands. "Fuck."

Mark leans forward and pats me on the arm. "Straight drama really isn't so bad after all, huh?"

I'm still sitting there when the sun goes down.

Addison never shows up for Mark.

Erica never shows up for me.

I eventually lie down on the sofa, but I'm still wide awake when the sun comes up.

Riding to work in the passenger side of Mark's car ... I finally cry.

He sits with me in the parking deck, saying nothing, until I can walk into the hospital. I go in with my head down.

And that's how it will stay for most of the day.

Jasper didn't speak to me for a week one time.

It was the beginning of the last 'normal' summer ... not long before the accident that would silence him without his permission. I had been home from college for less than two hours and my mother utilized every second of it to rake me over the coals for flooding the laundry room with my dirty clothes. Everything I brought home went straight to the laundry room, prompting Joel, Dad, and Jasper to make several trips back and forth between the cab and the washing machine. Infuriated, Mom yelled that she wasn't doing it for me and that I needed to learn to be an adult. I got pissed and went to my room, slamming the door, and stayed there until dinner. The smell of bleach almost knocked me down when I met Jasper in the hallway. His clothing was doused with it and his blue shirt looked tye died in places. I knew what he was doing immediately.

My laundry.

My mostly black and Emo laundry.

I shoved him out of the way and went running to the laundry room where my fears were confirmed. Three loads of clothing had already been ruined and bleach burned my nostrils as I rushed forward to shut off the washing machine, which was bubbling with soap. I slid down on the wet tile, effectively discoloring my black shorts and shirt and when I came up, I was screaming every profanity under the sun. My mother came running and thought I had done it, but I made it very clear that Jasper, who was cowering in the corner, was the responsible 'brat'.

He didn't join us for dinner and my mother forced me to apologize to him, but he wouldn't listen. He turned his back to me and flopped down on his bed, where he pulled the pillow over his head. For five long, silent days ... he didn't speak to me at all. Not when I tried to give him ice cream. Not when I offered to drive him to the skate park. Not even when I bought him a new skateboard and asked him to teach me to skate. He didn't talk at all until I sat down and watched a movie with him that made me cry. When he saw that I was upset, he left his spot on his favorite bean bag chair and sat on the sofa beside me, his head on my shoulder. Always ... Jasper smelled like home and freedom and it never felt like I was where I belonged until his familiar scent enveloped me. He always smelled like sea air and adventure ... like he'd been someplace in his imagination that was so real that it clung to him afterward. He apologized to me for being a brat ... even though he was anything but.

And I apologized to him for saying it ... and assured him it wasn't true.

He looked up at me and said, "I hate it when you're mad at me."

"You were mad at me," I corrected, ruffling his brown hair out of his eyes.

"There's a difference in mad and sad. Even if it rhymes," he told me. "I was sad. You can't think I'm a brat, Callie. That means that you don't love me no more."

"Then you could never be a brat because I'm always going to love you more than anyone in the world."

"Even Dad?"

"Even Dad." I grinned at him. "What? You don't love me more than everybody else?"

He looked very solemn, his freckled face growing still and somber when he nodded. "I love you more than God. And that's a whole lot because the whole Bible says we gotta love him most of all."

I remember how heavily that weighed on me. Jasper's ten year old heart was mine and I had been careless with it. He loved me more than anyone deserved to be loved and I had let my temper squander it away. We sat on the couch for the entire day and some people would call that wasted time, but I didn't think so at all. I was twenty years old and the best conversation I had all year took place right there ... listening to little boy half my age talk about love. And how much he felt it for me.

After he was injured and started to come back a little at a time ... I figured out that love was the medicine that brought him back. Even if it didn't heal him all the way ... it was his strong, loving heart that kept pushing him to do what the doctors said was impossible. He came back to us as much as he could. But he was changed.

As I operate on an eight year old girl who fell out her tree house, I listen to the determination of her heart beat. The monitor is steady, strong, and decided. She's going to live. She's going to walk again, even though her leg was almost a total loss. I know that my heart is doing the same thing. It's determined to keep beating even though I feel like there's a knife stuck straight through it. Staying at Mark's house was a bad idea. I should have gone home. I should have begged, pleaded, and cried until Erica tugged that knife out and threw it away. A simple smile from her would have stitched it just fine.

This fight, the past few hours ... it was an accident, too. And it has undoubtedly changed us both.

I'm scrubbing out of surgery when the door opens and Addison fastens her narrowed eyes on me. Her red hair is tucked under her plain blue scrub cap and she says, "You spent the night with Mark?"

"I spent the night on his sofa."

Her mouth falls open and she comes into the small scrub room, hands on her hips. "Why?"

"Because Erica is pissed at me."

"Then come to my place! Or, you know, go home and talk about it!"

I lean against the sink, massaging my forehead. "He waited for you to show up until ten thirty and then went to bed."

"Alone?"

"I'm on my PERIOD, Addison, and in case you failed to notice ... I'm not interested in Mark."

"Yeah, I must've missed that memo."

"Not you, too!"

"What am I supposed to think!?"

"That we're friends!"

"Whatever you say, Cal."

She storms out of the room, leaving me alone. The steady drip dripping of the leaky sink feels like a serrated blade against my brain and I leave before it kills me. Lunchtime finds me contemplating leaving the campus for something greasy and full of trans fat, then I remember that Erica has my car and therefore ... my keys. And she has my purse, which means that I have to rely on Cristina's generosity for lunch since I gave Mark his cab fare back. I follow Yang to a table in the corner, picking at the sandwich she bought me. When Erica and Addison come in ... and sit together ... I give up trying to digest and throw my mostly untouched food away.

I paid out the house to become a doctor so that I'd never graduate high school with scalpels.

I pass all the subjects except Life ... which I fail at spectacularly. I suck at it.

I don't see Erica again until after five that afternoon. My first day back at work was met with three surgeries and one combative man with fractures who called me every name in the book while I wrestled his bone back into place so I'm exhausted. She closes the chart she's working on when she spots me at the end of the hall and starts to walk away, but stops and turns back toward me, looking expectant. Standing there, she waits for me to close the distance between us and I oblige her like a well trained monkey. It's a ridiculous fault of mine ... to tuck my tail between my legs and go crawling back toward the source of my pain. I do it now because I'm drawn ... because the pleasure outweighs the pain on any day of the week. Even this one ... which has sucked enough to break me.

"Hi," she says heavily, her voice as distant as her eyes.

"Hi." I clench my hands into fists to keep from tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear. It's a lock that always curls, always disobeys the power of the flat iron in favor of doing its own thing. And I'm always incapable of leaving it alone. "How was your first day back?"

"Is that a trick question?" she asks. "I lost a patient which nearly killed me, but I'd say it falls just this side of losing you ... which will. Kill me. Eventually."

My heart, the one with the knife still in it, lurches into my throat. "So that's it? We're done? Just like that?"

"You spent the night with Mark Sloan!"

"No ... I spent all night waiting for you to come and get me."

"There's a difference?"

"Yeah, Erica, there is. I didn't sleep at all. I stayed on the couch and every single time I heard someone in the hallway I held my breath ... hoping it was you."

"You spent the night with Sloan," she repeats it not as an accusation, but with hurt and sadness. "I cannot believe you did that. Especially after we fought about him."

"I cannot believe we had that fight at all." I shake my head, glancing around the thankfully deserted hallway. "I'm blind sided here. This came out of nowhere and I don't understand it."

"Think really hard. I'm sure it'll come to you."

"I'm drawing a blank."

"Are you? You don't get why I'd be a little bit confused? Let's start with sex. The other day ... you pulled me on top of you and asked me to use my hands on you. You bucked up against me like you were searching for something ... more ... than my hands, Callie. I couldn't help but wonder who you were thinking about ... who you were trying to make me become."

I flash to the really amazing sex we had while my parents were at the Archfield collecting their things to stay with us. I asked her to use her fingers and she pulled my leg over her shoulder, doing just that. Her body was heavy against mine, her hips undulated hungrily against my own, pushing her fingers deeper into me, and I got off so hard it was scary for a split second. It was dirty, hard, and perfect ... but not for the reasons she thinks. "You want to know what I was thinking? I was thinking that I love being face to face with you. I love kissing you when you make love to me. I love being able to look at you when I come. And if I bucked up against you ... as you so eloquently put it ... it's because my body reacts to you. All I think about ... is you. I'm so sorry that I lose what little bit of control I have when you touch me."

The angry mask on her face cracks a little. I know that she's replaying the sex in her head the same way I just did. "Oh," she finally mumbles. "I - I thought - I assumed that you wanted ... that you needed ..."

"A penis? This is where I remind you that you keep offering to open my toy box and I keep saying no. If either one of us needs something more ... I'd say the evidence points to you. You're the one who won't leave it alone."

A couple of nurses walk past us and she looks away, watching them round the corner before she speaks again. "I don't. Need anything else. I've told you that."

"And I've told you that, too."

"But you did. Before me." She pulls the chart around, crossing her arms over it against her chest. She holds it like a shield, like the pink plastic cover strengthens the armor that already radiates from her. "I don't want to scratch another bi-curious itch. I just ... I can't. Helen -"

"Why are you bringing her up!?"

"I was a little bit rattled when she showed up here with her boyfriend! Okay? I never knew he existed or that he was serving in Iraq while she was with me. Some women ... they pretend, they experiment. They tell you that they're gay because it's not 'really cheating' on their boyfriends," she makes air quotes around the words. "And then they make a mad dash for the next man who walks in the room. And your box of toys, your past, all the men before me ... it scares me. I can't compete with that."

It's the same thing she said the previous night. "No ... they can't compete with you."

Her eyes fill with tears and she takes a step toward me. It feels like absolution is at hand, like she's going to chase away the fear and uncertainty with a kiss and I'm ready for it, I need it. My pager goes off though and I wrench it from its holder, swearing when I see the message. "Trauma. I gotta go. Look ... I'm sorry."

She nods.

I stand there for a little longer, waiting for her to say something ... hoping that she'll be merciful and either put me out of my misery or give me hope ... but she turns and walks away, still hugging the chart against her chest.

Mercy is such an ugly fucking word.

I find my purse in my locker when I get ready to go home ... wherever that is.

I check every compartment in it for a note, but there's nothing there. There's nothing on my phone either and I sit down on the bench as the weight of it hits me. Erica and I are in serious trouble and I'm still so baffled, so floored and stunned by the turn of events that I can't take it. Was it really just the day before yesterday that we celebrated the news of her test results? Just yesterday that she danced across the parking lot singing about loving me? How could that be the same person of last night and today? How could something so good ... turn so bad? Have I really been making her feel less than enough for me?

I get dressed and head down into the lobby. My keys were in the front pocket of my purse and I have no idea where she parked the Infiniti. I'm not in any hurry to find it, either, because the gas tank may be full ... but I have no idea which direction to point it in. I could crash on Cristina's sofa tonight ... or stay in an on call room at the hospital ... or sleep in the car.

As the elevator slides to a stop on the ground floor, I make up my mind to go home. Letting the distance between us keep growing won't do either one of us any good and I need Erica. Even if she's going to be pissed at me or tell me to leave ... at least I tried.

I see her sitting in the waiting room with a magazine in her lap, but she's not looking at it. She's watching the elevator and when I step out ... she gets to her feet. I don't know if I'm supposed to wait and see if she comes to me or if I should go and see if she follows. I feel like I'm an explorer in a new land, in uncharted territory, and nobody even gave me a fucking courtesy compass. I don't have to decide what to do because a stretcher is wheeled in front of me which makes me stop and by the time the coast is clear, she's standing in front of me and says, "Are you ready?"

"For?"

"Are you coming home or not?"

"I - I guess that's up to you."

"Let's go," she says. She moves her purse from her left arm to her right, putting it between us. Her hand rests on the strap, making it clear that she's not interested in holding my hand. Because she knows where the car is, I walk a few inches behind her, letting her lead. When we get there ... she goes to the passenger side and waits for me to unlock it. I oblige and walk around the vehicle, making sure that there's no glass or nails under the tires. She's watching me when I climb behind the steering wheel and I'm so nervous anticipating what she might say that I drop the keys into the floorboard. She puts her hand on my arm before I can retrieve them. "Cal?"

"Yeah?"

"We have to talk."

"I know that."

"I'm sorry. I know - I shouldn't have ... and it doesn't matter, but ... yesterday was the anniversary of my parent's death. And when I woke up yesterday ... I told myself that it wasn't going to bother me, but it did. All day long ... it bothered me and then the car was fucked up and Mark was there and ... I'm sorry."

Well, that's the last thing I expected to hear and while it doesn't pull the knife out ... it at least explains why it's there. "I'm -"

She cuts me off. "Tomorrow is the day they were buried ... the day I chose not to go to the funeral. We didn't have any other family so no one was there and ... and they hated to be alone. My mom ... she couldn't stand silence. I - told myself I'd go home this year and take flowers, but I didn't. Callie ... I'm sorry that I pushed you away ... I'm sorry that I made it about everything other than me ... because that's what it is. I wanted to be alone last night so I ... made you leave. But ... but I can't be alone tonight so ... please ... please come home. Please forgive me."

I watch her fall apart and I want to hug her, I want to pull her against me, but she keeps talking so I don't move. I barely breathe because it's so hard to understand her through her tears. "God, Cal, do you know what I thought? I really thought that if I had cancer ... it would be their way of punishing me. I thought the timing of it ... the fact that I'd probably get the results right around this time ... was their way of getting back at me. Or God's way. Or something. I was prepared for it because I deserved it. I didn't go back. I hated them for leaving me the way they did and it wasn't even their fault." She doesn't look at me when she grasps my hand. "It's not you, baby. I know that you don't want to be with Mark. I know that nothing happened. It's me. And ... I'm so fucking sorry."

Pulling my hand from her grasp, I open the car door. She calls my name like a plea when I step out, but I don't look back. Instead, I walk around to the passenger side and open her door. She practically leaps from the car and into my arms when I reach for her and I cling to her for dear life, rubbing her back as she sobs against my shoulder. It's the same way she cried when she got the results back, but this time I cry with her because she's shattered and the pieces of her have cut me. There's no joy, no elation or the feeling that we won something because we both shredded our dignity by lashing out as hard as we did. Those shreds are gone forever and we'll forgive each other, but never forget just how ugly it got. We had the kind of fight that bursts the comfortable bubble you carefully blow ... the one that's shaped like a heart and everyone can see that you're infallibly in love. We took it to an extreme that I thought we could never visit.

"It's okay," I whisper, holding her a little tighter. "I'm sorry, too. For everything. I should have come home, Yellow."

"I should have come and got you."

"You've got me now." I ease back a little, drying her face. Her lips are still trembling when I press mine against them and I feel my own respond in kind.

She's the one who deepens it, tilting her head and opening her mouth. She's tangy, salty from her sorrow, but her tongue is sweet against mine. She's always sweet. And like always ... I melt into her. I fall head over feet in love with her all over again ... no matter how much she hurts me. And when she presses her palms against my cheeks and her eyes search mine ... I believe her promise that it won't happen again. And I mean it when I make the same assurance, when I guarantee her that hell will freeze over before I spend another night away from her.

We drive home in silence, but she clutches my hand hard enough to say a million things.

At home, I pour us both a glass of wine and try hard to put something decent together for dinner. She watches me from the island and finally takes pity on me, salvaging the baked chicken before I turn it into charcoal.

Despite our reconciliation, neither one of us smile or laugh that night. Not even Ruma and Feo can lift our spirits by trying repeatedly to invite themselves to dinner by leaping on the table. They finally give up after I yell at them for the millionth time. They each shoot us a dirty look as they stalk from the room with their heads and tails held high. I could make a million jokes about it, but I don't say a word. She doesn't either.

Erica is trembling when she climbs into bed beside me later on. The fact that she's wearing pajamas that I've never seen before sends me the message that she's not in the mood for me to try to apologize the right way ... so I simply cling to her and she lets me.

I don't sleep much that night either.

The following morning, we get dressed in the same god forsaken silence that we ate dinner in. I don't have to yell at the cats for anything, however, because they're ignoring us. I'm mentally exhausted when we finally climb into the car for the ride to work, I turn the radio on some annoying morning show just to break the monotony. She suggests coffee and when I park at Starbucks, she takes my hand in hers and says, "I'm sorry."

"I don't want to hear that you're sorry. I want to hear that we're going to get through this. That we're going to be okay. That you ... that you didn't mean anything you said, Erica, because you fucking killed me."

"We are going to get through this. We're fine and I didn't mean anything I said."

"It doesn't count if I make you say it."

Confusion mars her features. "Then stop telling me what to say."

"Then say the right thing."

She lifts my hand and kisses it. "I'll buy you one of those disgusting frappucinos if you'll accept my apology."

"You'd have to also buy me a muffin and agree to McDonald's for dinner. Any time I want it. With no complaints. Ever."

With what can only be described as physical pain on her part, she nods. "Whatever you say."

"Whatever I say? Anything?"

Her eyes narrow. "Within reason."

"No, I think we're going to go with anything I say." I tilt my head to one side. "We're coming back from Italy a few days early and you're going to show me where you grew up. You're going to show me where you went to school, which playgrounds you liked, and then we're taking flowers to your parent's grave so that we can say goodbye to them together. Understand?"

The only sound in the car is the sound of her swallowing. "I didn't have playgrounds growing up, Cal."

In that moment ... I completely and totally forgive her for everything. Reaching out, I take her hand in mine and say, "Then we'll make our own, Yellow."

She squeezes my hand and nods. "Yeah, we will."

We will.

That's determination.

And there's mercy in that.

Not sleeping for over forty eight hours will make you feel, look, and act like a zombie. Karev snaps his fingers in front of my face twice before lunch to ask me about a patient's medication and I realize that what I've ordered for my charge could have been a fatal cocktail. I quickly scratch it out, changing the formula entirely, and head to the on call room for a nap. I open the door of my favorite one, which is pretty secluded and on the fourth floor, only to be yelled at by George, who quickly apologizes, but tells me that he's been on call for over thirty hours and nothing short of death should disturb him. I apologize and leave him there, opting for the third floor on call room that is far more noisy, but has a more comfortable bed. I'm asleep before my head hits the pillow and when I wake up, the sun is going down.

I grapple for my pager and check the time, gasping when I see that I slept through two traumas and a code. My pager, as it turns out, has been silenced and I know for a fact that I checked it before I dozed. I sit up fast enough to bump my head on the bunk bed and groan. A face appears over the side and I groan again when I see Savoy looking at me. "Well hello there, Sleepy Beauty. I was wondering if you had died down there."

"Get out."

"It's a free country. As you well know. People like you come here for a free ride all the time, don't you?"

"People like me?"

He simply smiles at me.

I pick up my shoes and tug them on. When I start to stand, however, he clears his throat and hops off the top bunk in front of me. He's so close that he brushes against me, causing me to stumble back to avoid being hit. He closes the distance between us, gazing down at my chest. My scrub shirt has twisted a little, revealing too much skin and I tug at it. "Get out of the way, Savoy."

"I have a few things to say to you about the M&M."

"Oh yeah? Put it in a Hallmark card and then slide it up your ass."

"Ha ha."

The back of my legs hit the bed, but I don't sit down. I hold my ground and he moves toe to toe with me. He's so close that I can count the pores on his nose. "What the fuck are you doing?"

"Well, for a while I was watching you sleep. Then I spent a little longer listening to you talk, but you didn't say anything interesting."

I start to move around him, to reach for the door, but he stops me. "Get out of my way!"

"What's your rush?" He gives me a coy smile and reaches up to touch my hair, but I bat his hand away before he can. "Aw, come on. You used to like it."

"Fuck you!"

"That is what I'm suggesting. You need a man, Torres. A real man."

He reaches up again and I see bandages on his fingers. He's left handed and three of his fingers and his thumb are wrapped in gauze and tape. I can see that the fleshy part of his hand is also cut and it looks pretty deep. It's the kind of wound we see in knife fights, when someone's hand slips on the handle and slides over the blade. He's sees me looking and drops his arm, putting his hand behind his back. I've seen enough, however. The abacus in my head adds two and two together and I gasp. "You - did you cut Erica's tires!? Did you!?"

His entire demeanor changes and he leans close to me, like he's sharing a secret that no one else can over hear ... even though we're alone. "What if I did?"

His words lick against my skin like the forks on a snake's tongue. I shove him away and for a second, I'm too flabbergasted to speak at all. I finally locate my voice and say, "You did!"

"Prove it."

"You're cut!" I tell him, gesturing at his hand.

"It's a hunting accident," he replies. When he speaks again ... I feel like I've been splashed with ice water. "Funny thing about deer ... they have really, really thick skin. You have to really work to clean them out."

It's all the confirmation I need and the newfound knowledge makes me lunge for the door. He catches me around the waist and tries to hang onto me, but I sink my elbow into his gut and he lets out a loud 'oooomph'. I feel his hands on the back of my shirt and put on a burst of speed, but it's too late. He gets a grip and yanks, nearly making me miss the doorknob, but not quite. "I want to talk to you!" he growls. "Come back here!"

I pull the door open as he rips my shirt. The sound of fabric tearing causes several people to look our way as I tumble into the hallway. I land on my knees as my scrub shirt gives way and every eye falls on him, looking scandalized. Of all the people present ... the last one I expect to do anything actually rushes forward. Izzie Stevens pulls me to my feet and says, "Are you okay?"

Before I can reply, however, Erica (who I hadn't noticed at all) rushes past me and plants her foot in Savoy's crotch. It lands with a sickening, ball crushing, pop and I cover my mouth with both hands with he screams and falls forward. I grab her before she can do any further damage and she turns, trying to assess whether or not I've been damaged in any way. I feel Izzie's hands on my back, holding the two flaps of my shirt closed and glance at her. There are tears soaking her face when her eyes meet mine. "Call the police, Callie. Enough is enough."

"You - you f-fucking bitch," Savoy says, still rolling around the floor. "You burn me and you'll get burned!"

Erica shoves Izzie away from me and takes off her white jacket, draping it over my shoulders. "Did he hurt you?"

"No." I glare down at Savoy, who is trying to untie his scrub pants in what I assume is an effort to see if Erica unmanned him. "He couldn't ... even if he tried."

For the record, Miranda Bailey may be a bigger badass than Erica Hahn. She uses the power of her steely death gaze to make the crowd in the hallway disappear when Savoy's hand goes into his pants and he gropes himself, screaming that he needs help. I look away and watch as people hightail it out of dodge. Izzie stays behind and Bailey holds out her cell phone, telling her to call the police. Izzie is so conflicted by this that her beautiful face contorts and she bursts into ugly, harsh sobs as she opens Miranda's out of date phone and makes the call. Hospital security arrives at the same time Addison does and she takes one look at me, one look at Savoy, and attempts to channel my mother and kick him, but Bailey stops her. Mort, the head of security, shuts Savoy into the on call room and leans against the closed door while we wait for the police.

I tell Erica and Addison what transpired and Addison glares at the door like she can melt it with the power of her mind. "He's right ... you don't have any proof."

"He confessed," Erica tells her.

"That's hearsay." I shake my head, pulling her coat a little tighter around me and the smell of lilacs settles my nerves so much it's like a tranquilizer. "It's his word against mine."

"And mine." Izzie is still lingering, still holding Miranda's phone. I watch her shift back and forth uncomfortably and hold my breath, waiting for the confession. "I was ... with him ... when he messed up your car. When ... we ... messed up your car. I broke your window, but he - he did the rest. I was mad about the fight you and I had and he offered to drive me home ... and your car was there. I didn't help him put the deer up on your porch. though. I swear to God, I didn't. He told me about it. He - he had gone hunting with his brothers and he said that they ... they were bored and ... they thought it was funny. Messing with gay people, I mean."

"Did you?" I ask. "Did you get another good laugh at my expense?"

"No," she replies. "I didn't. I told him to leave you alone."

I snort. "Yeah, right. I'm sure you did."

"If you weren't pregnant," Addison tells her, "I'd give you a hysterectomy with my bare hands right now, Stevens."

Miranda carefully puts herself between us and Izzie. By the time the Chief arrives, answering the summons from Miranda, Izzie is sitting quietly behind the nurse's station. Bailey starts to enlighten him, but the police show up and we go into the conference room, where I make the statement myself. Erica leaves for a few minutes, to retrieve the two earlier police reports from her briefcase, but then she's beside me again and for a second, I can forget that anything happened between us. I don't think about the pink elephant in our relationship at all. I think about how her hand feels on mine under the table. It feels so good that I lift it so that there's no mistaking it for anyone in the room and rest it on the table. She gives me a smile and tightens her grip and once again ... it's us against the world.

And we're winning.

The blinds are open so I watch Izzie go with the officer from the day before and her eyes lock on mine as she's led from the hospital. A moment later, another officer escorts Savoy past the window. He's in handcuffs and when he sees us, he yells that we're fucking dykes and that we should go to hell. I see a foot dart out in the hallway, tripping him. The officer pretends to be engrossed in his notepad, pretends that he didn't see it, and then Savoy's being wrenched to his feet and his nose is pouring blood. I hear the bastard beg for medical attention and Webber tells the officer to take him to Mercy West. I can still hear Savoy screaming his displeasure and threatening a lawsuit when the elevator doors slide closed on his tirade.

When Mark steps into the conference room and points down at his shoe, I have to grin. He shrugs innocently and says, "He fell over me. I don't know how that happened. I heard his nose break when he hit the floor, though. I guess the added pressure on his back was a bitch."

"Added pressure?" Addison asks.

Mark holds up both hands and shoves, then puts a finger over his lips and says, "Shhh."

Erica laughs beside me ... and it feels like the first time I've heard it in years. "Thank you," she tells him.

He comes in and sits down beside Addison as I sign my name on the official statement. The officer leaves us finally and Webber walks him out. With Addison and Mark on one side of the table and me and Erica on the other side ... I shoot Bailey a look and she puts her hands on her hips, pointing at us. "Something is going on with you fools and I know it! So, Mort's going to stand outside the door until you four idiots figure out what's wrong. And you better do it or I'll bust a nut. Oh ... yes I will."

She leaves us there and true to her word, she puts Mort in front of the door.

Mark clears his throat and says, "I'd just like to point out that I'm the only one in this room with a nut to bust so ... let's resolve this thing."

"I'll go first." Erica rests her free hand under her chin, propping it up with her elbow. "Mark, I owe you an apology for accusing you of being the vandal. I knew better."

"I accept your apology and would like to tell you that I'm also very sorry for lying to you about the relationship between Callie and Addison a while back. They were never lovers and I never got to watch. Unless you count my fantasies ... which just the other night -"

Addison slaps him, hard, on the back of the head and growls, "I'm not sorry for that."

"Ow, Addison! I thought people went to California to get their gentle hippy on. You came back all abusive and shit."

"Someone needs to take care of you with a firm hand!"

He arches a brow. "There's a particular part of me that enjoys a firm hand."

"Oh, you want me to slap your cock and balls the way I want to slap your face?"

Mark flips her a bird and looks at me. "You and me are fine, Callie. Me and Erica are fine. Addison may never be fine ... does anyone else want to say something?"

"I do." Addison pulls her shoulders back addresses me. "Something happened between me and you the night we worked on Jamie Carr and her baby. Now, I've heard of friendships starting in stressful situations before ... but I never realized what kind of bond you take from that. I knew I loved you, Callie, when you put your hand on my shoulder and you were crying ... not for the baby ... but for me. Because it was so hard on me. You've gotten me through hard times, ugly days, and made me laugh when I didn't think I could. Those are the kinds of friends you forgive and those are the kind of friends that you don't mind stepping in to try the guy you cast aside on for size. I have to stop being mad at you for being what I was unwilling to be for Mark. It's my fault that he was even in a place to fall in love with you and I can't hold it against you. Because I should thank you for taking such good care of him." Her eyes move toward Mark. "And I'd also like to say that when he's ready, when he wants to move on ... with someone ... I'm here. And I want to meet the guy that loved you as much as I do because I think I'd like that guy and could take care of HIM for a while."

And just like that ... they need a room.

My jaw drops open when they meet each other across the arm of the chair in a flurry of tongues, teeth and hands in inappropriate places. They don't even notice when Erica and I excuse ourselves and creep out of the conference room, leaving them to their own devices.

"Are you okay?" Erica asks as we climb the stairwell to the roof.

"I'm fine."

We step into the warm, golden glow of the sunset and she takes my hand as we walk toward the rail. "All this time ... it's been Savoy. I even scrubbed in with him a few days ago and he's the ... asshole ... who's been tormenting us. I just ... I'm shocked."

I shake my head. "I'm not. People are a constant source of disappointment."

She nudges me with her shoulder. "Are you talking about me?"

"No," I reply honestly. "You could never disappoint me."

"I think I did."

"There's a huge difference between disappointing someone and pissing them off. You pissed me off."

"Well, you got me back."

"Did I?"

She catches a lock of my hair that the wind is trying to twist and pushes it behind my ear. "I was pretty pissed, too."

"You're not now?"

"Are you?"

"No, Erica. I'm not."

"I'm not either."

When she kisses me ... I know she's telling the truth. I can feel it in the way she touches me, the way she caresses my face like she's cradling something invaluable. I smile when she pulls away and say, "It sucks that I'm on my period because I could think of a thousand better things to be doing."

"I got mine, too." She makes a face, wrinkling her nose. "We're doomed to have PMS together. Maybe one of us should get a time share for a few days a month because if this go around is any indication -"

I swat her on the hip. "You ... are stuck with me. Even if we're BOTH hormonal."

"We may kill each other," she advises with a warning lilt to her voice. "I'm just sayin'."

"What a way to go."


	23. Chapter 23

"I think you should know that I'm sorry."

Seattle is a big city. There are plenty of places to hide from the rain and I really thought that Applebee's would offer much needed seclusion from the downpour, but I was wrong. It's almost noon and I'm meeting Addison for lunch and this ... this is actually the last place I expected to run into Izzie Stevens, but here she is. The pink, short sleeved shirt she's wearing makes her look like a Barbie doll and I watch her adjust the strap on her purse and cross her arms over her chest. George once called her stacked. I wonder if he ever noticed the way she slumps and draws inward. She doesn't look stacked right now ... she looks ashamed of herself. I take a sip of my Sprite before I say, "So apologize."

"I - I just did."

"No, you said you think I should know that you're sorry and I don't. So convince me." I kick the chair out across from me and nod at it. "Why don't you sit down? You have a lot of explaining to do."

She glances over her shoulder at the door and I can tell that she's contemplating running, but she doesn't. Instead, she lowers her purse over the back of the chair and sits down. It's heavy, she flops into the chair like she can't hold the weight of herself up anymore. I watch her nervously rifle through the bowl of peanuts in front of us and wait for her to speak. She clears her throat three times before she finally does, "Look, Callie, what I did was wrong and I know that. I could tell you that I was scared the night he ... we ... damaged your car because this side of him came out that I had never seen before and I was terrified. He scared me. I was ... stunned. But then ... I had this big secret with him then so I thought I had ... him. The truth is ... I ... I finally thought someone cared about me. He made me think he did. And ... he didn't tell me that he did the deer thing right away. I swear that to you. I didn't find out at all until Erica's car got damaged, too, and I confronted him about it."

"Is that it?"

"No." When she shakes her head, a blond lock of hair falls into her eyes and I can see that it's oily, matted with dirt. "I became a doctor because I care about people. I - I know you don't believe that, Callie, but I do. I like helping people. I like making people feel better ... because no one ever did that for me. Growing up ... I didn't have the mother who worried about whether I had lunch money or the father who took me to the park. I had me. And I had this face that I used as my ticket out, but no one ever cared about what's behind it, you know? Nobody took me seriously when I said I was going to medical school because I was just ... pretty."

"I'm playing the world's smallest violin here, Stevens."

"I didn't know what it was like to have friends or family until I started working here. And I am probably going to lose my job, which I deserve, but if I have to leave the only home I've ever known, which is Seattle Grace, I'd like to leave with a little of my integrity back." She pushes that lock of hair back, but it sticks up instead of lying flat. I think of 'There's Something About Mary' and hide my smile in my drink. "I had a baby when I was sixteen years old. I gave her up for adoption and I made a promise to myself that the next baby I had ... I'd give things to it that I never had. So ... I wanted to give it a dad and Savoy ... sucks ... but he got me pregnant. He's the father. I guess I felt like ... I had to deal with what he did to you and Erica to ... fit into his life. I didn't mean for it to escalate or for you to get hurt."

"I didn't get hurt."

"Then I'm really glad."

"That's all really pretty. Pretty, pretty words from the pretty, pretty girl, but it doesn't explain why you hate me."

"George is the only person who ever made me feel important. I was ... safe with him. He didn't see the supermodel. He didn't make me feel like a piece of meat. And then you were there and he wasn't around anymore and I had depended on him so much that I went a little crazy."

"A little?"

"A lot," she concedes. "I confused being co-dependent with being in love. I just ... I think I missed Denny so much that I made George become Denny in some ways."

"I didn't really ask you for your life story." I lean forward, resting my elbows on the table. "Poor, poor pitiful you. You'll have to excuse me if I don't cry you a river just because you had a shitty childhood or had a kid when you were one yourself. I don't care. Everybody grows up in the mud, Izzie, most people wash it off and move on ... they don't start slinging it at everyone else."

"You know I'm testifying against him, right?"

"Do you want a gold star?"

"No. I want you to understand that I get it. And I'm willing to accept the consequences."

"But you don't think you should lose your job?"

She shakes her head no. "I'm good at what I do."

"Seems to me if you spent as much time being a doctor as you spent trying to fuck with me -"

"Look, I'm trying like hell to make you understand where I'm coming from. My life sucks and I took it out on you. It won't happen again and if I don't lose my job ... I'll go out of my way to be a decent coworker. Because I am a doctor and I busted my ass to get there. I'm sorry and if you could accept that ... then ... I just want you to accept my apology."

My pager goes off and I groan when I see that it's Webber. I've been summoned to his office twice in the past few days and both times it was to be yelled at for being distracted. As I clear the message and fish money for my drink out of my purse, I do a mental inventory of recent patients. I haven't killed, maimed, or screwed anybody up. So ... I'm drawing a blank. I get to my feet and say, "I didn't forgive you for what you did with George and I'm not going to forgive you now. I think the way you grew up is sad, but I don't give a shit. Being a victim doesn't give you free reign to victimize other people. And you may have something more going for you than good looks, but I don't see it. I see someone so stupid that they're pissing away the career they sold her body for. So if you get to stay at Seattle Grace, don't go out of your way to be decent to me. Go out of your way to be decent to yourself because that kid you're carrying deserves better."

I leave her at the table and head out into the rain.

When I open my umbrella ... it sounds like the wings of a great, big bird taking flight.

And that's how I feel as I run across the road toward whatever is waiting for me in Webber's office.

I've spread my wings, said my peace ... and I'm flying.

It's funny how speaking your mind can make you weightless.

"I called you both here to discuss this situation with Savoy and Stevens."

I let out the breath that is threatening to cave in my lungs and relax for the first time since Webber paged me to his office. I endured the walk to his domain trying to process what I could have possibly done to incur his wrath, but luckily it's not about me. Erica, who was already sitting across from him when I arrived, pats my hand and I swear that it's because she's so attuned to me that she knows when I'm about to have a heart attack. I relax into the chair and listen to the air go out of the seat all the way before I speak. "What about them?"

Richard opens a box of hard candy and holds it out to me, then Erica, but we both shake our heads no. "It's my understanding that Savoy is facing jail time."

"The District Attorney is interested in prosecuting the fuckstick within the full extent of the law," Erica tells him and covers my hand with hers now, holding on tight. "Malicious Harassment is one of the charges and it comes complete with a restraining order and up to five years in jail."

I watch Richard select a butterscotch and pop it in his mouth. He closes the lid on the box, but hangs onto it as he stares out the window. There's nothing to see except for gray, overcast skies, but he still watches as the candy scrapes against his teeth. It's been ten days since Savoy was arrested and every one of those ten days were rainy, muggy, and miserable. It completely ruined my plans of running through the streets shouting that it was finally over ... 'it' being the uneasiness of being a target. Erica and I ... we're no longer targets. We're holding the cards now and Savoy ... he's the one with the bullseye on his back. Testifying against him will give me the power and the wait for the trial is going to kill me. I'm ready to seize that power with both hands and hold it over my head in triumph as I point him out in the courtroom. I keep practicing ways to say 'He did it' in the mirror, making sure I look forceful and brave. I've got to tilt my chin just so ... it's pretty impressive.

"He won't be coming back," Richard says. "His contract at Seattle Grace is null and void."

"Well, that's only fitting considering that he can't give within fifty feet of either of us." Erica's thumb moves over my skin and I feel goose flesh on my legs.

I squirm in the seat and let my mind wander while they discuss Savoy. It's not that I don't have a vested interest in whether or not I'll have to deal with him if he doesn't go to jail ... it's just that I have more pressing matters on my mind. Erica and I have not had sex since our fight. Granted, we both took turns with the heating pad and argued over the last dosage of Midol we had between us the first few days ... but nothing has stopped us for seven of those days ... except us. When we crawl under the cover at night, she picks up a book and I pick up my laptop and we distract ourselves from the bigger picture. More than once I've fallen asleep sitting up and she's done the same, letting the book slide from her hands. We haven't talked about sex or our lack of it, either. It's the most non-verbal issue that I've ever had and I absolutely hate it. She still kisses me goodnight ... this sweet, chaste thing where she presses her lips against mine and then moves away before I can touch her face or hold her there. It's so bad that I even asked Yang to smell my breath. She refused, but she did call me several names and I'm pretty sure a couple were in Yiddish.

"Callie?"

"What?"

Erica's thumb is still rubbing my hand, but now she's looking at me curiously. "You're a million miles away."

"A lot on my mind." I wave my free hand, dismissing the fact that my head was somewhere in the clouds. "What'd I miss?"

"Are you okay?" Richard does that thing where he scrutinizes you without making you feel dirty. He's seen everything, experienced even more, and can make you feel like he's raking you over the coals with the intensity of his eyes. It's probably a good thing he never had kids. They'd be terrified that the all knowing oracle he has in his back pocket would expose their sins alphabetically. "Dr. Torres?"

"Yeah, sure." I give him a smile that I pray looks convincing. "It's just ... jarring."

"Jarring." He repeats my assessment of the situation and leans forward, resting his elbows on the desk. I involuntarily lean back a little further and have to fight the urge to dig my feet in and push myself away from his gaze. "I was asking for your input on Dr. Stevens. As you know, she is going to testify against Savoy in order for the charges against her to be dropped. She's asked me to let her come back."

Erica snorts. "And I've already pointed out that Stevens should have been shit-canned for what she did with Denny Duquette. I don't want to work with her, see her, or know that she's practicing medicine on anyone for as long as she lives. That's my opinion. Callie?"

"I - I don't have an - opinion. Whatever you need to do, Chief, it's fine with me." What the fuck did I just say? Did those words actually come out of my mouth?

"WHAT!?" Erica wrenches her hand away, looking scandalized. "She needs to be fired. She helped damage your car on hospital property. She knew that this asshole was responsible for everything that was happening and didn't open her mouth and say a god damned word to prevent it. You have an opinion, Callie! Give it!"

"Calm down, Erica," Webber says. His voice is gentle, but firm. His eyes move back to me and he gives me a reassuring smile. "Before I make the decision about Stevens' future at Seattle Grace, I want to know your thoughts. Do you feel comfortable working with her?"

"No," I reply honestly. "But I never have so this is nothing new."

"I see." He opens a folder and jots something down. "Do you feel unsafe, threatened?"

"I can hold my own."

"Yes, you've proven that by fighting her on hospital property," Richard replies.

"That's neither here nor there!" Erica snaps. "And you know it, Richard!"

My scrubs suddenly feel too tight and stiff. I hate listening to people bicker and that's exactly what Erica's trying to do with the Chief. She's practically growling in anger and he's attempting to placate her and justify his questioning. I feel like the scab that everyone wants to pick. I scratch my neck, then my arm as I try to feel comfortable in my skin. Why did Izzie have to tell me that she didn't have a mother who cared about lunch or a dad to play with her in the park? Now she's human and not the pretty, diabolical monster I've always made her out to be in my head. She's cracked ... there's an ugly scar in her beautiful armor and she fucking had to let me see it. "I really don't want to influence what you decide, Chief. Izzie is a bitch and I like seeing her in the hallways about as much as I like the idea of a gunshot wound to the head, but I don't want to impact whether or not she has a job. Don't put that on me. She's pregnant and -"

"Like that matters!" Erica growls, drawing out the 'r' sound. It's a dead giveaway that she's getting pissed off. "Having quadruplets, God help us all, wouldn't change the fact that she violated about a million hospital policies and ruined her own career. I don't want her here, Richard. If she's going to be here then I'll have to seriously reconsider whether or not I will be."

He chews the candy as he ponders her words. It's loud and I want to laugh at the absurdity of the entire thing. He's chomping on candy, Erica is fuming, and I finally have the chance to obliterate Stevens and don't want the responsibility of it anywhere near me. It's not even about taking the high road at this point. It's that I've lost interest in Izzie Stevens. She's a non-issue to me. Giving her the time of day makes me feel like I've wasted moments that could be be spent trimming my toenails or picking dead ends from my hair. The twenty minutes I spent with her at Joe's sucked the fight out of me. If she is sorry ... good. If she's not ... whatever. I just want it it over. And I don't want anyone's blood on my hands.

When the Chief excuses us, Erica follows me onto the breezeway and her arms are crossed tightly over her chest. We make it halfway before she grabs my arm. "What the hell was that?"

"The truth," I reply. We both lean against the rail, but my posture is a lot more relaxed than the rigidity she's carrying in her spine. "I don't care, Erica."

"How can you not care?"

"All I did for months was care about Izzie Stevens and what she was doing. Hell, who she was doing. She has exhausted me too much to give a good god damn anymore. That whole chapter of my life is closed. Whatever happens to her at this point ... maybe living with herself is punishment enough."

"Hop off the sentimental express before you lose your backbone entirely."

"Don't concern yourself with my backbone."

"Maybe Stevens should hire you for her legal defense. I can't believe you didn't stick it to her."

"If you want to stick it to her then knock yourself out."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"I refuse ... absolutely and completely refuse ... to fight with you. About this or anything else."

She sighs, clasping her hands in front of her as she watches people mill around the lobby below us. Her jaw is tight and she parts her lips a few times like there's something on the tip of her tongue dying to get out, but she doesn't utter a sound. I'm saved from filling the heavy silence by the arrival of Addison, who hands Erica a chart and asks for a consult. My girlfriend seems glad to have the distraction because she pores over the chart like she has a magnifying class, slowly and meticulously scanning everything. I watch her blue eyes dart back and forth as she processes the information and it's so damn sexy that I can barely stand it. I'm almost relegated to humping her leg when she takes her ink pen from her pocket and bites on the lid. It's one of her habits that is so mundane that nobody else probably notices, but every time she does it ... whether it's with a straw, a pen, or her fingernail ... my stomach starts to flutter. I think it's because I know what her mouth is capable of. I know what's it like to have her tongue strum against me, her lips undulate ... her ...

Addison snaps her fingers in front of my face. "Earth to Callie."

I blink and look at her. "Huh?"

"Welcome back," she says, giving me an impish grin. "What planet are you currently circling?"

Erica has put the chart under her arm and she's watching me closely, waiting for my answer.

I don't know how to say that lack of sex is making me crazy, insecure, and miserable.

Luckily, I don't have to say anything because my pager goes off again and saves the day.

I love pagers.

Maybe I should get everyone a pager for Christmas. It's the gift that keeps on giving ... me excuses to run.

When I first went to medical school I entertained the idea of being a pediatrician. I love kids. I love sick kids, healthy kids, noisy kids, rude kids ... all kids. Tantrums don't usually bother me, but as I try for the third time to lift a screaming, wiggling little boy onto the exam table and get a kick in the face for my efforts ... I'm glad that I went into ortho and not pediatrics. His shrill cry exacerbates the tension in my shoulders and I abandon the prospect of getting him to cooperate with me in favor of leaving him with his mother while I search for an ice pack for my jaw. I'm sure his leg isn't broken. After all, it's the one that connected with my head and he didn't cry out in pain, but I still take it personally when I break the ice pack and settle into the lounge to regroup. Kids are always the most rewarding and most challenging patients ... I just wish I wasn't challenged today. I've apparently lost my kid mojo along with my romantic mojo. Both are painful to experience.

I should be the happiest person on the planet because Erica and I will be leaving for Italy in less than a week, but that's not the case. I'm actually terrified because I don't know what's going on in my relationship, but something is. Sex is not the most important aspect of anything ... but not having it makes me feel like my arm is missing. And I don't know how to get around it. I've hinted a couple of times that I'm ready when she is, but that's all it's been ... a hint, a sort of invitation that was sort of declined by the presence of her pajamas. I took to wearing mine after day five, even though I prefer sleeping naked. And she actually commented on them. Not to tell me to take them off ... oh no ... why should she give me what I want?! She said they looked 'comfortable' which everyone knows is the most polite way of telling someone that they look frumpy and ugly.

The door opens and I glance up, nodding at George. He heads to the vending machine and when he joins me, he's holding out a can of Coke and a red velvet snack cake. I accept both. "Thanks."

"So, Lexie says that your patient is giving you a hard time."

"Yeah, that's one way of putting it."

"Want some help?"

"There's nothing interesting there, George. I probably won't even wrap his leg. He's fine."

"I could use the company," he tells me. "And eye bleach if possible because I innocently walked into the supply closet to do my freaking job and found Sloan and Montgomery doing ... bad things. Evil, evil things. I'm humiliated and I was fully dressed."

"Yeah?" I can't help but laugh. I kinda figured there was SOMETHING going on between them, something very debauchery filled, when one of the nurses randomly called Addy a slut in the cafeteria. Addison smiled like a freak, then ate my Reece's Cup like it was a celebration. "Finally."

"Ew." He shudders, then sighs.

I finish off the first cake and watch him do the same with his chocolate bar. He looks haunted and I take a swig of Coke to buy a little time before I ask, "You okay? Other than unwittingly becoming a voyeur?"

"You know ... I'm really not. A guy coded this morning on my watch. He was old and his heart couldn't take it, but ... I just had to tell his wife and grandkids. It never gets easier, does it?"

"No. It never does."

"Why are we doctors?"

I chuckle. "Because life would still suck if we weren't ... we just wouldn't get the added bonus of cutting people up."

"There is that." He slowly folds the wrapper that his Hershey bar came in, meticulously pressing creases. It's funny, the way you can get to know people. He folds things, napkins usually, when he's nervous or worried. A lot of doctors keep their hands busy ... like their hands will grow too weary to hold a scalpel if they're not constantly exercised. I play video games when my head is full. "So, I wanted to apologize about Izzie. You were -"

"I don't want to talk about Stevens."

"Okay." His green eyes are hauntingly familiar when they lock on mine. It's funny ... the way people get to know you. "Want to talk about something else?"

There was a time ... that I told him everything. I couldn't wait to share the details of my day and wait for his advice and input. He was my only friend, my confidante ... my husband. And despite his betrayal, I don't hate him. He's still the same George who happily pillowed my head with his chest while I cried about bad days. I haven't forgiven him either, because the skin he flayed off me will never fit right again, but when he looks at you that way and the scar on his cheek makes you realize that he's got battle scars too ... your tongue unfurls and you talk. "Erica and I had a fight a few days ago," I tell him. "It was bad. And the thing is ... I've apologized, she's apologized, we've both cried and said that it's okay ... but it doesn't feel okay. I - I think maybe - maybe she's still mad at me."

"So, ask her."

"That would be too easy."

"Do you want me to ask her?"

"That would be too high school."

"No, writing her a note with a yes or no at the bottom would be high school."

"That would be middle school, George."

"Oh. Well, I was a late bloomer. I was recently passing those yes or no notes." He smiles at me and shrugs. "I say talk to her. Relationships all work the same way ... and they all fail when you don't communicate."

"Speaking of communicating ... are you fluent in Lexie yet?"

His face turns bright red and he nods at me. "Very."

"Good for you."

"My mom hates her."

"Well, I did set the bar pretty high." I pat him on the shoulder and push myself to my feet. "Let's go deal with this kid. I swear, he has the most developed lungs on the planet."

I wind up operating on the screaming urchin.

You should never, ever diagnose someone as fine until you read their films.

I hope that Erica gets a good look at my chest x-ray before my heart bleeds to death with need.

The days leading up to Italy bring more of the same.

The biggest difference in how we spend our nights is the presence of a notepad on her lap while I surf the internet for things to do in Italy. She compiles a list of things we want to experience, jotting it down in her precise, neat, slanting handwriting. Everything is so efficient with Erica. She starts packing both of our bags four days before we're scheduled to leave and it's so organized, so well done, that I'm ashamed of my own packing skills. I don't have to show them off, however, because she takes care of everything. She actually forbids me from messing with anything or adding anything because she has a plan. The day before our flight, I finish laundry and watch her put neatly folded underwear in their respective Louis Vuitton's. She has pulled my luggage out for the trip and I don't even mind that we'll become a walking billboard for crime with such expensive bags ... I don't say a thing.

I haven't said a thing in days.

Nothing that matters, at any rate.

Neither has she.

We've laughed about sightseeing, joked about motion sickness on the plane, and cackled out loud pondering the possibilities of Ruma's claws and Mark's bare skin as he house sits, but that's all. We're acting like friends ... best friends ... but only friends. I haven't slept in her arms. She sleeps with her back to me for the most part and if I wake up before her ... I struggle with keeping my hands to myself because hugging her cold shoulder would probably hurt more than not. A line of demarcation has been drawn between us and I'm too afraid that it's been electrified to try to jump over it. One of us has to make the first move and my heart is begging me to do it. But I don't. I can't. The Torres' Family Tree is rooted in pride. It really is ... miserable people stay married because their pride won't suffer a divorce. Well, until me. I'm the first Torres in history, I think, to go there. My dad actually has a coat of arms that is supposedly all official and shit and it says 'Pride Comes First' in Spanish ... which is really asinine if you think about it because pride's a bitch and too much of it is a bad thing.

Fuck it.

I'm not making the first move.

She's the one who overreacted.

She's the one who hurt me.

Yeah, you try clinging to that when you're sitting on the runway waiting for your flight to leave for three hours.

Three hours! Delayed! I've counted the minutes off on my watch, attempted to pass time with my iPod, drummed my fingers on my leg, and thumb wrestled myself. There is a special hell for whoever is at fault for flight delays. And even though our pilot's voice is smooth as butter every time he makes the announcement that the wait is nearly over ... I'd still choke him if he was in front of me right now. With my bare hands. Which I now rub together as I tap my foot against the seat in front of me.

"Can you please be still?"

I'm in the window seat but staring at the airport is akin to watching paint dry. My ass is going numb, I need to stretch my legs, and the fact that Erica can calmly flip through a medical magazine and not feel the slightest hint of claustrophobia is infuriating. "I need to use the restroom."

"Then go use the restroom. Whatever you need ... just ... stop moving around."

As if on cue, the captain comes over the loud speaker and apologizes for the delay, then tells us to fasten our seatbelts. He's apparently sincere this time because we slowly back away from the terminal. Erica's already wearing her seatbelt and it takes a nudge from her to realize that I took mine off after the first hour of confinement. I can't get it to buckle, however, and she turns to help me. I'm aware of two things at once: there's way to much cleavage involved because she pushes her breasts together right in my face and her hands against mine are soft, supple, skilled ... and wonderful. She bats my futile attempt away and fastens the belt herself and I feel like moaning in protest when she leans back against her seat and the cleavage is gone, the smell of lilacs is faint, and she's back to thumbing through her magazine like she didn't just try to seduce me in first class.

First class.

I'm no stranger to first class. My only real encounter with anything less was flying home from college for Christmas and I got stuck on standby after a snow delay. I didn't work the cramps out of my legs for a week and forced Jasper to rub Ben Gay on them. That was a comedy of errors because a nine year old doesn't really listen when you tell him not to rub his eyes. There's plenty of leg room in first class, though, and I stretch mine out in front of me, popping my ankles. There's a television that's built into the seat in front of me, but it's been playing the same shit for the three hour delay and I'm so bored that I can barely stand it. I shift uncomfortably, realize that my ass is going numb, and try to relieve a little of the pressure by crossing my leg. I kick Erica's foot and she sighs, putting the magazine down.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see her watching me. "What?"

"You do realize how long this flight is going to be, right?"

"Six hours to New York. Nine ... since we're already late."

"I can't do six hours with you fidgeting. Why don't you read a book?"

"I don't want to read a book."

She holds up the magazine. "There's an interesting article in here about new hip replacements. Want to read that?"

"No."

Reaching up, I turn the air conditioner vent on full blast and lean my head back against the plush leather. I don't like to fly. I was pretty much scarred for life when I was fifteen and the plane that carried my family home from a vacation in Colorado caught fire. Jasper was asleep in the seat next to mine and after an emergency landing, complete with a hyperventilating woman screaming that we are going to burn to death, I gathered Jazz in my arms and he clung to me as we rushed for the exits. Naturally, he got a great big kick out of sliding down the slide ... I didn't get anything from it except for an epic wedgie and heart failure. On the next flight ... that screaming woman sat in the aisle and she prayed the entire time, begging to cheat death again. It was quite the experience and while I've never had any other near misses ... taking off and landing will absolutely take my stomach every single time. I hate it. And turbulence will make me start praying.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine."

"You want some Dramamine?" She squeezes my left hand with hers and I watch her absently rub the diamond band that she put there.

Her thumbnail worries each diamond the same way my father worries his rosary beads. He does it when something is weighing heavy on him. Or when he regrets something. It makes me wonder if she regrets exchanging rings, living with me ... being with me. Usually, she can't keep her hands off me. Before we fought and I spent the night at Mark's ... we would usually make out on the sofa the second we got in from work. Lately ... we bypass the couch entirely and she sits in the kitchen while she waits for the oven to preheat for dinner. And I surf the web, lying on my stomach on the bed that we ONLY sleep in. God, it's killing me. "Erica, you don't think I slept with Mark ... do you?"

She stops worrying the diamonds. "No. I trust you."

Okay, I've decided to face it ... I'm a crier. My eyes fill with tears as the plane moves into line on the runway. It lurches to a halt as the pilot waits for the command and I grip the seat handle. I keep my eyes on the television screen and it swims in and out of focus. "Then why don't you want me anymore?"

It's her turn to fidget and she's just as bad as I am. She shifts her weight, recrosses her legs, and alternates between gripping and barely touching my hand. "You've been really mad at me, Callie. I said things to you that I haven't actually forgiven myself for so I understand it, but I haven't stopped wanting you. I just - I don't know what to say to undo what I shouldn't have said."

I look at her and I'm shocked to see that her eyes are just as moist as mine. "I'm not mad! I told you I'm not mad!"

"Yes, you are." She doesn't blink, doesn't look away. "You avoid me at work. You hide out in the lounge at lunch or go somewhere with Addison ... and you haven't invited me to go with you. You speak to me in two word answers when I try to talk to you and if you slept any further away from me at night you'd be hanging off the bed."

"Well, you sleep with your back to me!"

"If I sleep facing you then I'm going to be all over you and that's not what you want."

"Don't tell me what I want!"

"Then tell me what you want, Callie!"

"You! I want you!"

The plane inches forward and stops again. I'm ready for Dramamine, Valium, Morphine, Lithium ... anything.

What I'm not ready for ... is Erica moving her hand from mine ... to my leg. I'm wearing yoga pants that are thin enough to make me feel everything and when she hooks her fingers and I feel her nails on my inner thigh, I nearly pull the armrest off the chair. She faces straight ahead, her eyes intently on the television like it's playing her favorite show, giving no indication that there's anything else going on. When her hand moves to my stomach, my breath hitches and I squirm in the seat. She seizes the opportunity and slides her hand into the waistband, then under my panties. Her middle finger settles on my clit and she doesn't move it.

She wants me to do the work.

I don't move. I can't move.

Leaning a little closer to me, she says, "I want you every second of the day. When I wake up ... and you're warm under the cover beside me... I want to bury my face between your legs and wake you up by tracing my name against you ... with my tongue."

My hips undulate and my heart starts to pound hard enough that I can see it when I look down. "Erica -"

"I want you in the car ... like this ... with my hand down your pants. I want to listen to you come as we pull into the hospital parking lot ... because that's a great way to start my day."

She increases the pressure and another finger ... God, I don't know which one ... dips into me just slightly, pulling moisture back to my clit. I'm going to need the oxygen mask soon. "You -"

"Shhh." She leans a little closer and when she speaks again, it's a whisper. "I want you in the on call room after I watch you bend over and I can see your panty lines under your scrubs. I think about bending you over the bed and fucking you so hard that you can't stand it. And if I see you in the observation deck watching me operate ... I think about the way you look behind the glass in the shower. And what you taste like when you first step out of the water and I trace the droplet with my tongue. I want you, baby ... I want you all the time."

I push forward, increasing the pressure of her fingers and I can feel her breath on my neck. Speaking is out of the question ... I've almost swallowed my tongue. She circles, pinches, and scrapes the bundle of nerves between my legs and my toes curl up in my flip flops. She rubs my ear with her nose and says, "I want you at night, after you have driven me completely insane by rubbing your finger around your wine glass. Because I know what those fingers feel like in me ... when they," she curls her fingers as the plane begins to taxi down the runway and the knuckle in her thumb pushes against me. "thrust like that."

My own knuckle goes into my mouth to prevent me from screaming as the plane soars into the air. She slides two fingers into me as I come, feeling it for herself. "I want you," she continues, "when I'm at my worst ... because you bring out the best in me and I love who I am with you. I want you, Callie. I'm pretty much resigned to the fact that I always will and I'm not complaining. I love you."

I start to protest when she pulls her hand away, but I get it. We're airborne and the attendants will begin their mad shuffle to give us everything we need. I turn my face toward hers and kiss her before she can move away. "I love you."

She pushes my hair back and smiles at me. "When we land in New York and have to sit there for a two hour layover ... you're going to go in the bathroom with me and return the favor. Got it?"

"Gladly."

"And you'll stop fidgeting now?"

I nod and put my head on her shoulder.

She wakes me up after we land.

And I make her come twice in the bathroom before we board the flight that will lead us toward bliss.

The airport in Italy is definitely nothing to write home about. It's hot, spartan, and full of exhausted looking travelers. I hear a million different languages as we attempt to find the baggage claim. I'm caught off guard when someone begins speaking rapid fire Italian at me. I guess I look native, which is interesting. I apologize in English and they say something back to me that is probably rude and unflattering, but I simply shrug. I should have taken Italian. Or French. Instead, I took Spanish which I already knew because it was a gravy course for me. Erica eventually figures out where our luggage is and we see that it's been set aside since it took so long for us to find it. By the time we arrive at the car rental, we're both frazzled and out of sorts. I've got both of our International Driving Permits and already took care of the car rental online so they get us in and out fast.

Which is not the greatest thing in the world.

When I rented the Smart Car ... I didn't really think it would be a clown car. I was expecting something small ... you know ... like a Prius. What this car is though ... is the front half of a Prius and nothing else. I could probably bench press it. I'm appalled.

And Erica's reaction when she sees it is nothing short of horrific. "CALLIE! WE ARE TALL AS HELL! WHAT ARE YOU THINKING!?"

"It's ... cute."

"You bitched about the leg room on the plane! And our leg room was roomier than this - this entire ... it's not even a car! A ten speed bicycle is bigger than this."

"It's environmentally friendly."

"It won't make me friendly and I'm way deadlier than global warming."

"Everybody drives them here," I assure her. I open the trunk and grimace as one of the men in first class with us cranks a yellow Lamborghini and drives off the parking lot. "We don't need to have a sports car, Erica," I tell her when she eyes a nearby Porsche. "We don't need to compensate for anything. Look, this is ... it's not like we're going to be in the car that much anyway. It's ... cute."

"No matter how many times you repeat that ... it's not true. It's not cute."

"It's red."

"That's blasphemy. That's like painting a Volkswagen Beetle candy apple red and expecting it to race."

"Hey, Herbie did it!" I lift the first suitcase and it pretty much takes up the 'boot'. I close the door and attempt to shove the remainder of our luggage through the space between the seats. Erica finally takes pity on me and climbs into the driver's seat, helping me push as hard as we can. It finally fits and I settle into the passenger side, securing my belt. She takes her camera from her bag and grins at me. "Smile."

"Oh! Come on! Pictures!"

"I promised your Dad." She snaps a photo of me scowling at her and then walks around the car, taking photo after photo of me crammed into the seat with luggage hitting me in the back of the head. If I don't shove the camera up her ass in the next three weeks ... it will be a miracle.

I regret my decision to 'go green' the second we pull into the road and I feel like I'm riding a rollerblade. My shoulder rubs against Erica's as she navigates the narrow streets and I have to stop myself from telling her how to drive because that's a great way to get on her bad side. I've made that mistake exactly once and have yet to repeat it. To keep my eyes off the road, which should scab my ass since it's dragging against it because we're so LOW, I open up the directions to our cottage. They're well done and we find the place within thirty minutes. I can barely believe it as we turn off the main road and the bustling city disappears. To the left, there's a sea of sunflowers. To the right, there's a vast, open field of green where horses are trotting toward the fence to greet us. "Stop," I tell Erica. "Right here."

She obliges by pulling off the shoulder of the gravel road, which she really didn't need to do since the car doesn't take up its half of the road, and I untangle my legs and climb out. There's something about the smell of horses that always takes me back to Jasper. He loves horses so much. Most of his birthdays have always included a horse and he'll ride until he's bowlegged. I feel sentimental as hell when I step up to the fence and rub a brown stallion on the nose. He moves forward, butting me on the cheek and I pat him on the neck as he stretches toward Erica. She looks a little nervous as she strokes the side of his head.

"You've never been around horses, huh?" I ask.

"When I tell you that I've had a very boring life ... I mean it. Buddha was the first animal I ever had for more than a couple of days. My father would throw rocks at anything that tried to make nice with me. I didn't see much."

"Then I guess I'll have to show you the world."

She puts her arm around my waist and pulls me against her, kissing me. "What makes you think you haven't?"

I hear the sound of hooves hammering the earth and turn in time to see a wiry looking woman in dirty overalls draw her horse to a stop. She glares down at us from her perch and scratches her chin as she appraises us. There's open disdain in her face as she takes in our appearance, which I confess isn't really nice. We're wrinkled, weary, and it shows. I open my mouth to speak, but she says, "Do you like my horses?"

"Yes." Eric smiles apologetically. "We didn't mean to -"

"You're Erica Hahn," the woman says. "You definitely carry your German ancestry in your features. And you," she looks at me. "are Callie Torres. You're not from Mexico. Are you Cuban, perhaps?"

"Half," I tell her. I watch her take the hat she's wearing off and rub her forehead with a cloth. I feel her pain. I'm dripping sweat. The one thing I didn't anticipate was the heat. It's different than Miami's heat, which can be sweltering at times. Her hair is mostly gray, but I think it was probably blonde at one time. Her cheekbones are high and her green eyes are large in her thin face. "Your accent ... is it Georgia? You sound a little like my mother."

"Close." She grins, exposing a row of dazzling white teeth. "South Carolina born and raised. I vacationed here with my family when I was seventeen and I never went home."

Erica gestures at the scenery around us. "Who would? This is beautiful."

"I didn't say for the landscape, honey. I'm Claudine." Settling her hat back on her head, she nods at us. "I own Angela Abbey. Thank you for renting it. You bought that horse for me and while you're a little late for dinner, I think it'll still be good when you warm it up."

"You cooked for us?" Erica looks stunned. "Thank you."

Claudine shoots me a scathing look. "You need to teach her about Southern hospitality. It's still the same ... no matter which country you're in."

"Yes, ma'am."

She tips her hat and winks at me. "If you need anything ... I've left the number to the main house beside the phone. Don't hesitate to call me if you need anything, but I don't expect to hear from you. The Abbey ... she has a tendency to be exactly what you need without any help at all. Y'all have a good night."

We watch her trot away as quickly as she arrived. Several of the horses match her pace and follow her, which sounds amazing. Erica nudges me with her shoulder and says, "Is that a Southern thing? Talking about a house like it's alive?"

"No."

"I like her, despite the creepy vibe."

She holds her hand out to me, but I shake my head and bend down, plucking a lone sunflower from it's spot near the fence post. I hold it out to her. "I like you. Wanna have sex?"

Taking the flower, she nods. "Absolutely."

Sex has to wait.

Angela Abbey was, at one time, a small chapel. The front is solid rock and there is ivy covering most of the stones. There's a bell over the front door, large and brass, and a small cross that rises from the roof on a metal pole, casting a long shadow over the lawn. Erica parks beside the house after we ease past the front, commenting on everything, and I can see that the backside of the building has been completely modernized. There are floor to ceiling windows everywhere and I'm so ecstatic to see air conditioning that I can barely stand it. I had worried at first, when I saw how much Erica paid the travel agent, but if the inside is only half as great as the outside ... we actually underpaid. We decide to explore before we attempt to dislodge the luggage and we act like giggling schoolgirls as we lift the various planters around the front door to locate the keys. Erica beats me, like always, and opens the door.

It's beautiful.

There's really no other word for it.

Everything Italy ... is inside the room.

The four walls of the living room are covered in murals, muted colors that capture Tuscany with it's majestic vineyards and sprawling greenery. The furnishings are earthy, complementing the colors perfectly. There's a plasma television over the rock fireplace, but I barely notice it because there's so many other things to see. Erica opens an armoire that sits next to the fireplace and exposes an entertainment system that is state of the art. The drawers are stocked with movies and cds and I know that I can waste hours rifling through them all. Erica seems to realize that I'm tempted because she quickly shuts the doors and tugs me down a hallway into the kitchen. As impressive as the kitchen is back home ... this one is better. Everything is oversized and one entire wall holds nothing but wine bottles which is never, ever a bad thing. I never really cared for wine until Erica, but now I enjoy it ... probably only because she does. But I've acquired the taste and can't wait to experiment.

I open the refrigerator and take out a casserole dish, pulling back the cover. The heavenly aromas of pepperoni, sausage, and heavy tomato sauce makes me realize how hungry I am and I turn the oven on to heat it. We both take bottles of water as we climb the spiral staircase in the corner of the kitchen. The master suite is upstairs and I gasp when I see the insanely tall bed and the step ladders beside it. It's a sleigh bed, which I'm a sucker for, and the quilt covering it looks handmade. I run my hand over it and start to comment, but Erica opens the vertical blinds along the wall and I gasp as I'm drawn forward. It's so hard to believe that a view exists that can compare to the one from our backyard ... but here it is.

I can't believe the intensity of the greens. The trees, the rolling hills ... it makes the sky look like fading bruises as it bleeds into the horizon. I've never seen anything more breathtaking in my life. It's untouched by man, from the looks of it. There are no buildings, no concrete or wires. It's just an open expanse of NOTHING that feels like it could be the cusp of everything. Erica opens the sliding glass doors and we step onto the patio. I hear water bubbling and see the hot tub in the corner, then step to the rail and peer down at the pool. It's bigger than what we thought it would be and I can't wait to dive in and swim. My entire body is leading a revolt against me for sitting on my ass so much. Even prowling up and down the aisles in first class didn't help circulation.

"I'd say I did okay," Erica tells me. "For someone who's never had her passport stamped."

I move behind her, wrapping my arms around her waist. "I'd say you did better than okay. This ... this is paradise."

"So, you're happy?"

"I'm better than happy."

She turns around, leaning back against the rail. Her hands move to my hips and she studies my face for a few seconds before she speaks. It's unnerving. I swear to God ... having her map me the way she does can go either way. It can be the most erotic thing I've experienced or the most unsettling. It's like she's seeing into me when she does it. "Can I ask you something?"

Her face is tense. She wears her emotions on her face even when she tries hard not to. At least with me. I brace myself for whatever's coming because just the hint of it feels heavy. I nod, even though I don't know if I want to hear it. "Okay."

"When we have another fight ... and we will, Callie, because we're us ... will you come home?"

I bite my bottom lip as I nod. "I have regretted not coming home that night every second since it happened. I'm sorry ... and yes ... I will come home ... no matter how bad it is."

"You promise?"

"I swear." I rub her cheek and it shocks me that I can still marvel at how soft she is. I've touched every inch of her ... repeatedly ... but when she's vulnerable like this ... she's softer than silk. I could run my fingers over her for a million years and it's incredibly fucked up that I won't live that long because even if I die in her arms ... my last thought will be that I wish we'd had more time. "I was home that night in my heart, Yellow."

"I know. I saw you everywhere."

"What you said about me bringing out the best in you ... that's true." I move a little closer to her and rest my hands on her shoulders, then move them around her neck. "I'm so proud of you for telling me about the anniversary of your parent's death and letting me see how it affects you ... because that's -"

"That was not the best in me."

"Yeah, it was. Maybe not the part where you called me a 'fucking bitch', but the fact that you can grieve for people who hurt you ... that's the best in you. You didn't become a heart surgeon because it pays so well or because it's the most respected ... you became a heart surgeon because you have a big heart."

"If you blow my cover ... I swear to God ..."

"Your secret's safe with me, but I think you should know that you wear your heart on your sleeve where I'm concerned. Everyone knows that I've got you right where I want you."

"That's not true."

"No?"

"You want me in the bed, but I'm not there."

"I technically want you in the pool." My stomach rumbles because the smell of our dinner has climbed the stairs and I give her a playful smile. "After we eat."

"What's for dessert?"

"Like you have to ask."

I don't think twice about stripping off my clothes and skinny dipping because there's no civilization to be seen for miles. Completely naked, I dive into the pool headfirst and swim the length underwater. I can't believe how cool the water is considering that it's still hotter than hell despite the fact that the sun has set. I come up for air and smile because Erica is dipping her toe in right next to me. She's one of those people who have to test everything instead of leaping with careless abandon into the unknown. At least she has no qualms about being in her birthday suit, which I take a moment to appreciate as she taps her the bottom of her foot against the water. Her legs are long and slender, but she has muscle that is evident in her thighs. Her hips are wide compared to her waist, which tapers perfectly before it contours out to her ribcage. Every single spot on her ribcage is ticklish and I've nearly made her pee her pants after playing them like an accordion on more than one occasion. And I don't think there's anything in the world that could be more perfect that the view from underneath her healthy, cancer free, C cup breasts ... unless it's feeling them.

When she pulls her foot out of the water and lowers the other one, barely submerging enough skin to cover her toenail, I grab her ankle and pull her in. Just as I knew she would, she comes up swearing magnificently and splashes me in the face with water. Her hair is already wet and full of some kind of conditioner that prevents it from turning green so I don't worry too much about dunking her again. Overpowering her in the water is so easy for me. She has pinned me to the floor on more than one occasion ... which she did a few weeks ago when I tried to eat the last of the ice cream ... but in the water ... I win. It's something I realized while we horse played in the ocean behind my family's house. She's not timid in the water, but she's a little clumsy. I torment her for ten minutes before I finally take pity and stop pulling her off her feet. She holds up her hand when she sees me coming toward her and says, "I will suffocate you in your sleep if my head goes under again! Callie! I mean it!"

I move against her and wrap my arms around her waist ... she responds by putting her legs around me. The opportunity is just too good to pass up. I slide my fingers against her cleft and her head falls back, giving me plenty of tender spots to kiss. I lick the pulse in her neck and taste the chlorine from the pool, but it doesn't matter. I also taste her ... and I want to taste ... her. Turning, I tell her to pull herself out of the water and help her do so, setting her on the edge of the pool. I'm chest deep now and I pull her to the edge, easing her legs over my shoulders. When my mouth finds her ... she's swollen with lust and so wet that I have to smile. What's funny ... is that I never really understand why some men insisted on giving me oral sex. I didn't think they enjoyed it. I didn't know why the act was so appealing ... but now ... as I make her cry out and jerk against me ... I get it. It's more than the feel of her flesh quivering or the way her release is something to savor when it finally hits ... what it really is ... is whispering to her sexuality, tying my tongue around her core, and relishing the flavor of something that only I can summon.

She comes without the aid of my fingers and I slide my tongue against her to feel the spasms I've caused. She clenches a handful of my hair and nearly yanks me bald before she drops back into the water with a splash. I've lost count of how many times she's kissed me, but I'm pretty sure that none compare to the one she plants on me right now. Maybe it's the water, maybe it's the way my breasts bob against hers, maybe it's the fact that we're out of the country ... out of the world ... but whatever it is ... I want to be kissed that way every day. I didn't even realize we were moving in the water until I feel the stairs against me knees. She sits down with me on her lap and leans down, taking my nipple into her mouth. I know what she wants when her hand moves between my legs. I push myself upward on my knees and sink down on her fingers, three, I think. It's hard, it's fast, it's maybe even a little furious and I don't know how there's any water left in the pool considering how much we thrash and splash. I come with my mouth against hers and we stay there for a while, me straddling her lap while she holds me tight.

When we go to bed ... we sleep face to face, our arms and legs entangled like they should be.

Something tells me that Italy is going to be very, very exhausting.

And I can't wait.

I'll teach her to cut me off.

Oh ... yes ... I will.


	24. Chapter 24

When you think of Italy ... you think of those cobblestone streets and outdoor cafes where you leisurely sip wine and watch the natives meander happily to and fro. You think about how the Leaning Tower of Pisa leans but doesn't fall and about the heavenly aroma of Italian food wafting from every other building, luring you, making you stuff yourself. I personally thought of three things: pizza, sex in a foreign country, and skydiving. Erica wrote skydiving on our list in such small letters that it looked like a heart monitor flat lining, but I went ahead and bought the tickets. I'm thinking it will be fun ... if I survive actually telling her that we're definitely going ... because she may kill me.

What I never thought of is a racket so loud that it startles me out of the bed.

But there you have it.

My first morning in Italy does not find me happily stretching in the rising sun or waking Erica up in new and exciting ways.

It finds me sitting on my naked ass on the floor, feeling as shell shocked as I probably look, as something screeches in a way that makes the hairs on the back of my neck dance upward. It could very well be Gabriel's trumpet signaling the end of time because it's THAT bad.

"Erica!"

"What are you doing?" She sits up in the bed, sleepily rubbing her eyes with one hand while she feels around for me with the other. "Cal?"

"Down here."

She leans over and gazes down at me, smiling. "Are we playing naked Twister again?"

"There's something outside!"

The demonic ... whatever it is ... howls again and she raises a brow. "That?"

"YES, THAT!"

"Please tell me you're joking."

I scramble back into the bed when I hear it again. "I am not."

"Callie, my sweet, innocent little city girl ... that's a rooster."

"WHY!? WHY IS IT DOING THAT!?"

"Dear God."

"Look, I don't make fun of you for not knowing ... stuff."

"Are you actually shaking right now?" She puts her arm around me and laughs. "Oh my god ... you are!"

"I don't like birds! Bats, parrots, chickens -"

"And roosters apparently."

"And roosters." The offending rooster cries out again and my flesh crawls at the thought of it being nearby. For the love of all things holy ... it could have crashed our pool party and caused me to drown from sheer terror. Anything so fluffy and fat that walks on skinny little bird feet is not normal. "They have that gross double chin thing, right?"

She nods. "A little."

"I guess there is an animal worse than a bat. God, my vacation is ruined by fowl."

"Awww, come here." She pulls me down with her and I rest my head in the crook of her arm. "Go back to sleep."

"Can it get in the house?"

"Yeah, they keep lock picking kits in their double chins. You'll wake up with him sitting on your chest just in time for him to peck you to death."

"Fuck you." I shove the cover off both of us and stand. "I'm awake now and if I'm awake then you're awake."

"Oh, come on! Shit! I'm tired!"

"Get up, Yellow!"

She rolls over and pulls the pillow over her head. When she speaks again, her voice is muffled. "People sleep late on their vacations!"

"Erica." I reach out, gently shaking her shoulder. "Erica, look at me."

Peering out from under the pillow, she stares up at me and even though her eyes are still heavy with sleep, I could drown in them. Hers are a different kind of blue, deeper, bottomless. I start to tell her that we have plans, but the way her gaze moves over my naked body closes down all lines of communication. She may as well be rubbing me all over the way she looks at me when she says, "Jesus. You're beautiful. Why don't you let me -"

I shake my head. "No. It's not gonna work. You are not getting me back in the bed. Come on ... we're finally in Italy. Let's go see it."

She rolls onto her back and crooks her finger and every ounce of my resolve goes flying out the window as I move closer to her, close enough for her finger to trace the scar she gave me on my stomach when she operated on me. I look down, watching her pale finger move across my flesh and this time ... the hairs on the back of my neck dance because of her. It's entirely unexpected the way she can distract me in a millisecond. She rubs against my belly with her palm and says, "I can't believe how straight this scar is. My hands are steady as hell, but when I picked up the scalpel and looked down at you ... I nearly had to ask someone else to do it. I couldn't stop shaking. And then when your heart stopped ... Jesus, Callie ... mine did, too."

"Well, it's not like I planned that." I climb back into the bed and lie down, facing her. She slides her leg over my hip and I hook her behind the knee, pulling her closer. "You saved my life."

"No, I threatened you." She pushes my hair behind my ear and smiles at me. "I shocked you that first time and nothing happened so I leaned down ... right at your ear ... and told you to come back or I'd kick your fucking ass. And you, being stubborn as fuck, made me shock you again before you did it."

"I heard you."

"I don't think I've ever been that scared in my life. I was about to crack into your chest and start massaging your heart ... whatever I had to do."

"You cracked into my chest a long time ago and you've been massaging my heart every since." Leaning forward, I give her a kiss. "You know, I really thought I was going to die that morning. One minute I was eating waffles and the next minute I was bleeding out. It's funny ... what you think about when you're in so much pain that you can't breathe. My head was full of things I wanted to say to you and I hated that I'd never get the chance. And then I felt your hands on me and I could smell you ... lilacs ... and I thought ... I thought that if I had to die then at least the person I loved was there with me at the end."

Erica gives me a kiss and I can see that her eyes are wet. "I kept trying to get you to look at me, but you wouldn't."

"I was sorta humiliated because I was screaming like a baby and -"

"Uh, I saw the damage, Callie. I'm surprised you were conscious at all. You had so much blood in your abdominal cavity that it was like a volcano when I finally got in there. I was covered, the floor was covered." She makes a face, remembering it. "I stayed in recovery with you for as long as Richard let me, but he took over and put me out after an hour. I was devastated at how close it had been. I almost lost you."

I can see what the experience cost her from the expression on her face. She looks haunted, bordering on tears. I put my head against hers and say, "You know that's the first time I can ever remember not being happy to see Jasper. When I finally woke up ... he was right there, watching me ... and all I wanted was you."

"You destroyed me when you finally did see me."

"Did I?"

"Uh, I walked you in the hallway and told you I wanted to be your friend and you told me you were in love with me. I had wanted to hear that forever and you gave it to me, then took it away. I nearly died right there."

My mind goes back to that day. My confession of love had come pouring out the same way my blood had. She cut me open long before she ever held a scalpel and exposed every ounce of truth in me. I should have followed up my declaration of love with a kiss that could fix what I had broken instead of a kiss goodbye. Just thinking of the way it felt to mouth the words 'I love you' instead of screaming it out loud is enough to make me fall apart now. My chin trembles when I say, "We - no - I ... wasted so much damn time. I wish I could do it all again so that I could do it right this time. We should have -"

"Don't, baby. Things happen for a reason. We couldn't be HERE if we hadn't gone THERE," Erica tells me, rubbing her hand over my arm. "We learned what it is to be without so it makes our time with each other better. And we'll never forget how hard we had to fight for us ... that's why we value each other so much."

I wrinkle my nose. "You think I value you?"

"I know you do."

"You're very wise."

"Great sex makes great minds."

"Then I should be smart as hell. I really, really enjoyed flying with you, Yellow."

"I could tell." She licks her bottom lip as she lightly runs her fingernails over my breast. "I'll have to make sure the ride home is just as ... enjoyable."

"You know what?"

"What?"

I flip her onto her back and straddle her hips. "I've decided that I'm going to tell you a different reason that I love you every day of our vacation ... and every day after that."

"Ooooh, I like this decision."

"So, here goes." I rub against her, rocking my hips. "I love your dirty talk and here's a little tidbit of information: I could have gotten off on the plane, without you touching me at all. Your voice, when you were telling all those naughty little things, was that hot."

"Is that right?" She runs her palms over my legs, then grips my hips tight enough to make me hiss. "Let's test that theory. I left out a few of the other times I want you."

Just like that ... I'm flat on my back and she's in control.

Our first full day in Italy ... all we see is each other.

I'm fucking convinced that there won't be anything in Italy that can compare to how utterly breathtaking she is to me.

Time flies when you're having fun. Our first week in Tuscany seems to come and go in the blink of an eye. We take a bike tour of the Chianti wine country and we're both so miserable that we have to soak in the hot tub for three hours that night. It was well worth it, however, because Erica got tipsy on the wines we tasted (actually, I tasted and she drank) and spent the bike ride back to the plaza telling me all the ways that the creator of the bicycle should have been murdered while she attempted to keep her balance. She got her sports car for a day when we toured Florence in a 1950's Fiat and saw so much of the countryside that I was spellbound. There's nothing quite like wind blowing through your hair while you enjoy the feel of freedom with the person you love. Several cathedrals lured us into their depths, taking up an entire roll of film and we sat in the pew for over an hour listening to a boy's choir rehearse so beautifully that it made me cry. Museums, restaurants, and one market after another filled our days and kept us out until late almost every night ... but without fail ... every night ... we made love. As much as I love Tuscany, she takes me to new and better destinations every single time she makes me crumble under her touch.

It's not until our sixth day in Tuscany that things get tense. I'm trying to get my hair to do something that doesn't involve frizz or tangles while Erica showers. Technically, she interrupted my shower and told me to get a move on because we're visiting Pisa today, but that doesn't really matter. I finally give up and plunk a baseball cap on my head when I hear her phone ringing. I hurry down the spiral staircase and answer it before it can go to voice mail. To my shock, it's the mortgage company and they assume that I'm Erica before I can correct them. For reasons unknown to me, Erica's almost a month late with her payment and there's talk of penalties and late charges so I interrupt the customer service representative and give them my credit card number. For good measure, I authorize them to deduct the next payment, which is due the following day, out of my account as well. Erica comes into the kitchen as I'm hanging up and helps herself to a leftover cinnamon roll.

"Who was that?" she asks, pulling apart her roll and biting into it.

"Apparently bill collectors don't care if you're in another time zone."

Her eyes widen. "What?"

"Mortgage payment."

"Shit!" She throws one hand in the air. "I made arrangements to pay that when we get back. I'll call and -"

"S'okay. I took care of it. And this month, too." I self consciously touch the cap on my head, trying to see my reflection in the microwave. "Do you think maybe it's the water here that's making my hair so unruly?" When she doesn't answer, I look up at her, stunned when I see how red her face is. "Erica?"

"You don't have to make my house payments."

I feel my eyes widen. "Your house? I'm sorry ... I was laboring under the illusion that we lived together. You do keep correcting me and calling it 'our' place instead of yours."

She looks down at the floor for a few seconds, then back at me. "I appreciate it, but I don't need your help."

"I don't mind. You don't let me pay enough as it is. We should split everything." I pull off a piece of her roll and pop it into my mouth, then lick a bit of cinnamon off my finger. "Okay?"

"No, it's not okay. You already insisted on flying us out here first class and - well, I can pay my own bills. I just had to reschedule a couple of things because of this trip, but ... it's fine."

Before we left Seattle, I ran across a bill for our rings and saw that she had paid it in full. It wasn't chump change and she absolutely refused to let me half it with her. She hates credit cards and she let the bill for my bracelet dangle less than a month before she paid that off as well, not that I was snooping when I watched her do an online bill pay. Debt is something that Erica Hahn cannot stand. She makes incredible money, but her recent medical scare came complete with deductibles and co-pays so I'm sure her bank account is suffering when you factor in our impromptu vacation. And she invests almost everything. I finish off my roll and say, "We're in this thing together so I'm going to pay my part from now on. End of discussion. By the way ... don't make any plans for tomorrow because I have a surprise for you and -"

"I realize that your parents have more money than God-"

"Okay, whoa! My parent's money has nothing to do with me!"

"You make sixty thousand a year as a resident, Callie. You paid almost twenty thousand dollars for our plane tickets out here and back."

"So?"

"Ask any other resident if they could afford that."

"Most other residents have to pay off their medical school bill, Erica. I don't."

"All I'm saying is that -"

"Stop saying anything before you piss me off!" I snap. "I have my own money that I earned and I can spend it on any fucking thing that I want. Including your house payment so just ... shut up about it."

"I just think -"

"I'm not kidding! Stop talking!"

"We have to go. Our tour is going to start soon."

For what it's worth, being slightly pissed off in a Smart Car makes it even less comfortable. When you can't control your temper and then cage yourself in a tiny mobile hell, everything feels worse. My knees hit the dash twice as she navigates the narrow streets and she develops an insane case of road rage that has her clenching the steering wheel until she's white knuckled and shouting at other drivers. Once again ... I'm lost in my own head and unsure of what to do with myself. When she finally parks in the designated area and we see the Leaning Tower of Pisa in the distance it drives home the fact that we're on vacation and we're supposed to be celebrating our life together. I'm also thinking of the fact that my sex life is only just now on the upswing again so the last thing I want to do is sleep alone, but that's really not the only reason I swallow my pride and say, "I really don't want to spend the day fighting with you. I don't want to spend ANY day fighting with you."

"I know."

"I'm sorry."

"You don't need to be," she replies, taking my hand. "It's me. Again. When you grow up without money you tend to look at it a little differently than someone who did. You don't care about it, Callie. You're the kind of person who is perfectly fine to live on Yang's sofa or in the basement of a hospital, but you still won't bat an eyelash when it comes to dropping cash on something you really want. I'm the kind of person who wants a nice big house with a ton of wasted space, but I think about every dime I spend in the process. I never want to know what it's like to be poor again."

I turn a little in the seat, watching her. She worries her bottom lip between her teeth as she looks out at the crowd of tourists. "I was 'perfectly fine' on Yang's couch, but I've never been perfectly happy until right now. You gave me a home, Yellow, the first one I've had since I left Miami. So let me drop cash on it ... because it's something I really want. And if you're having financial -"

"My finances are perfectly fine. The stock market sucks lately and I didn't transfer some funds like I should have. I don't need -"

"I get it. You don't need me."

"Hey, I need you. You are the ONLY thing I need."

"Don't ever assume that I'm sponging off my parents again." There are some things in your past so humiliating that you can't bring yourself to admit it, but sometimes that's all you can do. "Do you remember that incredibly annoying song by Mariah Carey when she first came out?"

"All of her songs are annoying."

God, there is nothing in the world quite so mortifying as this. "'High On Love'."

She nods emphatically. "Ohhhh yeah. That was like ... the most overplayed song while I was at college. It was the summer anthem. I wanted to perform heart surgery on her while she was awake."

"I wrote it. And summer anthems have very, very nice royalty checks."

"Oh my GOD!"

"Do not freak out!"

"Why would you ... do you know how appalling it is to hear people running around singing 'catch me catch me in your glove because baby baby I'm high on love'?!"

"Shut it."

"That's a bad song."

"It pays really well."

She lifts my hand and kisses it. "You know what? Feel free to pay off my mortgage as your punishment for writing that shit. I lost actual brain cells."

"I got better over time."

"There are others?"

"I'll never tell."

I lean over and kiss her, making a mental note to avoid mentioning how lucrative penning a few songs actually is.

It's way more than the sixty thousand dollars a year she knows I earn.

Actually, I spent more than that on tomorrow alone.

But I have something important to say to her ... and I want to make it memorable.

I'm cooking us breakfast the next morning while she goes over the loose itinerary that we planned. We haven't really stuck to it at all and the lack of structure is getting to her. Even though we're seeing everything, she still picks up every brochure while we're out and pores over it like we're missing out. And more often than not, she jots down the more interesting locales on her ever present notepad and puts stars beside it to indicate its priority. She's telling me something about a Medieval Torture Museum when I clear my throat. "Uh, baby?" I say softly, putting a plate of French toast in front of her. "I made plans for us already. Remember?"

She puts her notepad aside and smiles at me. "That's right. What kind of plans?"

"Impressive ones."

"Intriguing. Can I have a hint?"

"You'll like it." I sit down, trying to look as innocent as I possibly can but since she knows just how filthy I got this morning ... I'm sure she sees through it.

"Callie," she drawls my name, making it sound like a warning. "There are several things that we talked about doing that I have absolutely no intention of doing. Keep that in mind."

I think of the skydiving tickets in my purse and take a bite of my breakfast to buy some time. My options are to tell her now and then spend the morning convincing (begging) her to go or get her to the dive school and then spring it on her and hope that she doesn't make a scene. Considering that being in front of people has never stopped her from speaking her mind before, I decide to save myself any embarrassment and drop the bomb now. "Let me see your list."

She hands me the notepad and I look at the scrawling, scribbled line that is supposed to say 'Skydiving', but it really looks like someone tried to underline something. I put it down in front of her and tap my finger on it. "Remember this?"

"No."

"We agreed to do this, Erica."

"No," she repeats, shaking her head. "No one agrees to jump out of a perfectly good plane."

"Then how do you know what I'm talking about?"

She rapidly cuts a piece of toast and drags it through her syrup. She shoves it in her mouth, talking around it. "I can read what it says. I'm a doctor."

"That's not a word. That's a scratch."

"There are two things that fall out of the sky: fools and bird shit."

Her tone is not quite as deadly as it CAN get so I clear my throat and say, "Well, here's the thing, I already bought the tickets. And I picked the best reviewed place, but it's pretty far away so I rented a helicopter to take us and a limo to drive us around and there's a spa and -"

Her fork clatters to the plate and I close my eyes. Even though I'm ready for it, I still jump when she yells, "YOU WHAT!? CALLIE, THAT COST A FORTUNE!"

"I know," I say, holding up my hands. "It was very expensive, but you insisted on paying for the cottage and I wanted to do something special so -"

"WHY WOULD YOU PAY SOMEONE TO THROW YOUR ASS OUT OF A PLANE!? OR MINE!? FUCK!"

"It's safe. We're tandem jumping and the -"

"We? Do you have a mouse in your pocket!?"

"That's cute, honey." I take a deep breath and watch her mask of resolve fall into place. This really isn't going the way I had hoped. "I worked my ass off getting all of this stuff in order. You'd be proud of how structured it is. And you will love jumping. I promise."

"I am not doing this and neither are you!"

"I've done it before! A million times!" I put my hand on hers, feeling bolstered when she doesn't pull away. "I told you that I want to show you the world and -"

"I don't care to see the world racing toward me at a thousand miles an hour while I pray that the parachute opens and try to keep an eye on you at the same time." She pushes her chair back and grabs her plate, scraping the contents into the sink. I listen to the disposal and when she shuts it off, she adds, "I'll pay you back for my ticket. And for yours-"

"Don't bother. I'll jump twice." I get to my feet and put my hands on my hips. "Do you want to come and watch?"

"DO I WANT TO WATCH THE LOVE OF MY LIFE POSSIBLY DIE AGAIN!? GEE, LET ME THINK ABOUT IT! NO, I DON'T THINK SO!"

"Please stop yelling at me, Erica."

"THEN STOP GIVING ME REASONS TO!"

I push my chair under the table and pick up my plate as well. She moves out the way and I put the breakfast I was pretty proud of through the disposal. "It took me two weeks to get everything worked out for today. I got us reservations for dinner at a place that's usually booked months in advance and I wanted you to see some of the sights at night because I've heard it's beautiful. The pilot's giving us this big tour on the way back so - please?"

"Fine," she snaps. "I'll go to dinner with you. I'll even happily fly around in the helicopter, but if you so much as act like you want to jump ... out of anything ... I'm not going to speak to you for the rest of this little trip. Got it?"

"Child."

"Whatever."

The pilot who flies us to the city where the flight school is has more charm than a man possibly should. He's even more charming than Mark Sloan, but I think that came with his age. Easily sixty years old, Vincenzo Capozzi possesses the ability to weave flirtation into the story of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, making it sound dirty and phallic as we fly near it. I take his innuendo in stride, but I catch Erica looking less than impressed with his over the top phrasing a couple of times. She hasn't spoken to me since our failed breakfast and I personally can't wait until lunch because I'm starving and I'm a stress eater anyway. To take my mind off her aggravation, I listen intently to Vincenzo's running commentary on the small village beneath us. The helicopter is tiny and I'm crammed against Erica in the small back seat. If it's even possible, we're more cramped than we are in the Smart Car and that's saying something. The biggest difference between Italy and America that I've found is that possessions are smaller (cars and homes), but the land feels so much bigger than anything back home. The view is enough to take my breath away. I haven't seen so much greenery, so much color, in my entire life. Every color in the a box of crayons is right here and I'm so impressed with it all that I've taken the camera from Erica on more than one occasion to try and capture it.

"Out to the right," Vincenzo continues, undaunted by Erica's sullenness, "is one of the castles I told you about earlier. You can see that parts of it are in ruin, but every time the workmen get in there and start to rebuild ... something happens to stop it."

I lean over Erica's lap so I can see out the window. Vinny, as he told us to call him, is absolutely right about the castle in question. Only three of the four impressive walls are standing, but I can't concentrate on the view. Erica's eyes are on me again and once again ... they're doing something to me that I can't stand. She doesn't look angry so much as annoyed and I hate that what I had hoped would be a romantic and fun day is apparently falling flat all the way around. I move away from her and lean back, turning my attention to my own window, but it's no use. I don't see much of anything after that. You know, it's funny ... I guess maybe I assumed that since Erica took to rock climbing and camping with me that she'd just be gung ho for anything. I mean, after all, she did also brave sunrise yoga and you don't do that unless you're hard core, but still. I shouldn't have taken it for granted that she'd be as adventurous and I am. I'd probably get pissed if she just assumed that I'd want to spend an entire day at a cooking class ... I'm not that brave.

The flight takes just over an hour and by the time we land, I feel like I've been shaken and poured over the rocks. My legs are little bit wobbly as Vincenzo helps me from the helicopter and I feel like I'm still vibrating as I take a few steps. I accept my bag and thank him for the trip and he parrots the time that he will meet us that night. I check my watch and resign myself to the fact that it's going to be a very, very long day. Especially if Erica's mood doesn't improve. Because it's still early, the heat hasn't gotten unbearable and I check my phone, pulling up the email that has directions to the limo. One great thing about Italy ... they have great directions. I lead the way and we're at the car within minutes. The driver is holding up a sign that says Torres-Hahn and for some reason, that makes me feel very, very good. I catch the smile on Erica's face when she sees it as well and about fifteen pounds of pressure leaves my shoulders.

If she likes our names combined ... that's sort of a good sign.

Maybe today won't be a complete waste.

Unfortunately, the driver didn't get the memo that we would not be going to the flight school. I'm about to make small talk with my girlfriend ... you know ... the one who isn't actively speaking to me ... when we stop and the door opens. The only silver lining in the entire debacle is the presence of a market just across the street from the school. I know that it's conceding defeat, but if she doesn't want to skydive then I can't really force her and even though I built an entire speech in my head around leaping out of an airplane and all the lovely analogies and metaphors that go with it ... I really don't want to risk her ire to jump myself. So, I suck it up, hold out my hand, and lead her away from the school. She laces our fingers together and even though a couple of parachutists drop not too far from us, she doesn't mention it and neither do I.

What I'm beginning to learn is that the only thing that feels better than winning the battles ... is not wasting too much time firing your gun. It's okay to raise the white flag.

I'll tell you something else I've learned ... the smell of authentic Italian food will give you something to talk about when there's nothing else at all.

We pick a cute little bistro that has outdoor seating and a view of the canals and we're laughing comfortably before our bread arrives. I eat pizza, she eats pasta, and we split a bottle of wine that is easily the best I've ever had. If she's only pretending to be over our fight she's doing a good job of it. She pulls her chair closer to mine as we eat dessert and kisses me so often that I completely forget that I'm not fifteen thousand feet in the air waiting to leap. She makes me feel like I'm even higher. For nearly two hours, she alternates between kissing me and trying to sing 'High on Love' to me. She pretends to interview me, picking my brain about the song and whether or not it was written for anyone in particular and I weave a tale worthy of J.K. Rowling as I make up one lie after another about a supposed romance with a major league baseball player. She pretends to fall for it and asks me for an autograph. On my napkin I wrote 'I love you' in Spanish, then add 'Yellow' in every language I know, which isn't much. And only one is fluent. She looks at it, presses it to her heart, then puts it in her purse.

Sentimental, thy name is Erica Hahn.

When we finish up, a man in a gondola calls to us and I have to chuckle. Sailing in a gondola is somewhere at the top of Erica's list and there are four stars beside it. I nod at her and tug her toward the water and she happily follows. Within minutes, we're reclining on overstuffed pillows while we're serenaded badly by our eager oarsman. Here's something that they don't tell you about Italy. The canals are putrid. I have never smelled anything quite so disgusting. My nose alternates between itching and running in protest. I don't comment on the foul smell, but I do breath through my mouth and I hear Erica doing the same.

On the plus side, there's something quaint and serene about the vantage point we have. We watch a woman hanging her clothes from her second story window, winding the line like they do in the movies. We see children kicking cans and scruffy dogs barking at a lot of nothing and most of all, we see the city in a way that people saw it before there were cars to complicate things. The architecture is archaic and beautiful and some is so whimsical that it almost looks like a joke. Before long, I'm not thinking about the smell at all and I can appreciate everything from the poorest, crumbling buildings to the ritziest, appointed bricks.

Erica leans her head against my shoulder and says, "If you want me to jump out of a plane with you ... I'll do it."

"She says after the window of opportunity has passed," I reply. "Too late. The classes ended an hour ago. They're taking the last of the jumpers up."

"Can we do it tomorrow?"

"I'm sure they're booked."

"I'm sorry. I should have done it. I mean, how many people can say that they skydived in Italy?"

"Neither one of us." I put my arm around her and rub her bare arm. As disappointed as I am, it doesn't last. It can't last with her. "But how many people can say that they've had mind blowing sex in a sunflower field in Italy?"

"Neither one of us."

"Yet." I laugh when she does. "Can I please proceed with my plans for the rest of the day? With no arguments?"

"Is there a sunflower field in your plans?"

"Maybe." I take her hand, worrying her ring the same way she worried mine on the plane. The rubies are sparkling in the sun. She keeps it so clean that it makes mine look dull in comparison. I do just that, studying my yellow diamonds, my hand next to hers. We're quite a pair when you get down to it. Some would say that we're as different as night and day and that's probably fair, but we also strike a balance that is perfect. She likes to cook, I like to eat. She likes structure, I like to see what happens. She invests her money wisely, I spend it capriciously. I value family, she has none. Yes, we are polar opposites in a lot of ways, but in all the ways that count ... we're identical. Unless you count our tempers which are exactly the same and far too overused.

"What are you thinking?" she asks and I catch a concerned break in her voice.

She's obviously having the same nervous breakdown I had on the flight, but before I can allay her fears, the gondola bumps against the rough steps where we began our journey and the ride is over. Our gondolier climbs out and helps us both do the same and I offer him more money, but he refuses. I get my bearings, scrolling through my phone and locating the directions again. This time, they lead us to a hotel that is so ritzy, so swanky, that it makes the Archfield look like a Motel 6. We're both dressed in classic 'tourist' gear, but that doesn't prevent the staff at the spa from welcoming us with open arms. Before I can do little more than verify our reservation for Bella Grotto Spa, Erica and I are whisked to a changing room where we're given silky robes. After a luxurious soak in a mud bath a hot stone massage, we shower and put our robes back on. Manicures, pedicures, and a haircut comes next.

I watch Erica in the mirror, making sure that the stylist doesn't scalp her and then we're styled to perfection and artistically made up. When I go back into my changing room, I smile because the dress I picked for myself is hanging on the wall and the shoes are not exactly worth what I paid, but they're still just the right shade of yellow to go with my dress. And what a dress it is. I took Addison's advice and went designer and when I zip myself into it and gaze at my reflection ... I decide it's worth it. Granted, it was three times what Erica's mortgage is in one month, but it's also flawless. Strapless, and straight across the top, the back is slightly gathered, cinching it tightly over my hips and thighs. It grazes the floor in the front and there's a slight train trailing behind me.

My ass looks amazing.

I take another look at my hair, which has been magically tamed in a way that I've never witnessed in my life, and breathe deep.

This is it.

I'm about to take a huge leap ... even without the plane.

Picking up the yellow clutch that goes with my dress, I quickly stow my wallet and lipstick inside, and look at myself one more time.

Here goes.

Erica is opening her door at the same time I'm opening mine and I freeze. Red ... red is definitely her color. I see cleavage, I see her neck, I see her smile and nothing else in the world matters. Her eyes are impossibly blue and I can't decide if it's the makeup or the dress, but I want to bottle whatever it is. She has never, ever looked prettier. My mouth falls open and I say, "Wow," which really isn't the most clever thing, but I have to say something to keep from crying.

She's gazing at me the same way. "You look just like you did in my dream. You are ... beautiful doesn't even do it justice."

"You're amazing." I reach out, running my fingertips over her exposed clavicle. "Jesus, Erica ... I -"

"Ma'am?"

I turn and grit my teeth when one of the women from the front counter beams at me. "Yes?"

"Your reservation?"

"Right. Thank you." I watch Erica retrieve her purse, unable to keep my gaze from wondering all over her body. She's curved in every place that counts and the dress that I chose for her showcases every last one of them. It's almost vulgar, but it's not because of the design. It's because I know what's underneath it and I can't stop picturing it. Our heels click against the tile and I see several heads turn to follow our progression as I lead her to the front desk. I ask for both of our oversized purses to be stowed in the safe and quickly fill out the paperwork, putting the slip of paper in my clutch.

We clasp hands in the elevator and we can see our reflections in the polished surface of the doors. Her eyes are on mine as we head for the restaurant. She's giving me the same, serene look she gave me on the balcony in Miami when she helped me off the railing and we kissed for the first time. It's a look of wonder, awe, and I know that her mouth is just as dry as mine when she turns toward me and strokes my face. I couldn't speak if I had to and she opens her mouth to say something, but nothing comes at all. When her mouth finds mine ... it's soft and tender, but full of longing. I feel what she can't say loud and clear ... with every pore in my body. Some things you have to show ... you can't tell and by the time that we arrive on the roof I've been told just how much she loves me and I've said it back at the top of my lungs.

To say that we're treated like royalty is putting it mildly. La Bella Luna, the premiere dining experience (according to Google), is even prettier than I had hoped. We're literally on the roof, there's no canopy against the stars and the moon seems to hang suspended right in front of us. If I didn't know better, I'd swear that it was being projected like the Bat Signal into the sky because it's so full and clear. We take our seats and watch as Japanese screens are put up around up, blocking our corner from the rest of the patrons. The wait staff leaves just enough room to move in and out of and leaves us with two thick menus. By the time we finally order, my stomach is rumbling from the smell of the food that's already being served.

"Callie, this is -"

Flickering lights catch both of our attention and I lean forward in my seat in anticipation, holding my breath. Erica has a soft spot for opera and even though I can't say the same, we listen to the applause from a nearby outdoor theater and gaze down at the production like we're sitting in otherworldly box seats. Yeah, sue me. I was trying to recreate the classic opera scene from 'Pretty Woman' which I happen to know has been watched more than once by a certain taciturn cardiothoracic surgeon. Even though I'm pretty new at romance and have absolutely no idea what I'm doing, I would be willing to bet a million dollars that she is enjoying herself. Even though our dinner passes in silence except for the beautiful singing below us, we exchange a million smiles and hold hands over the big finale. I have no clue what I just watched, but it's apparently good because Erica stands up to applaud and I'm sure that the other diners on the rooftop do the same even though I can't see them. When the theater darkens, she looks at me and there are tears in her eyes. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." I accept the kiss that she gives me and like I always am ... I'm so fucking grateful to get it. I make myself sick sometimes. I never, ever expected to feel this way. I never expected to be that person who obsessed over every minute detail of a twelve hour span of time, but that's exactly what I did. I drove myself absolutely insane trying to make sure we had the best seats (I even paid double), and that I could time the skydive just right so that's we'd have plenty of pampering and not have to rush at the salon. "So, because you missed it. I'm going to tell you exactly what you experience the first time you jump out of a plane."

She puts her wine glass down and gives me her full attention. "I'm all ears."

"Even though you spend a while learning the logistics of it, your heart still starts to pound when you walk toward the plane. There's a little part of your brain that tells you to run and you look over your shoulder and wonder if you've already crossed the point of no return." I cover her hand with mine. "You keep walking forward though and even though you're terrified, you climb into the plane and hold your breath as the propeller starts to turn.

"The ride down the runway feels like it takes a million years and you close your eyes when it finally picks up speed. That's when you savor the feel of the runway because it could be the last time you feel land. You enjoy the bumps, you don't mind how rough it is, and your heart starts to skip as you feel the wind slice and give in, letting you rise up with it.

"You open your eyes and look out the window and you say a little prayer hoping that everything will be safe and you'll hit your mark when you land. If you land. And then you think that ... if you're doomed to spending the rest of eternity flying around ... it won't be so bad because the view is pretty spectacular by now and you're kinda mesmerized.

"You listen to the pedestrian, mundane conversation around you and you wonder why no one else's head is in the cloud with yours. Because you're about to do something that you've never done before. You're about to leap headfirst into the abyss and you're trust someone else to pull your parachute and carry you through the landing." Reaching forward, I run my fingers through the ends of her hair, my eyes on hers. "When the doors open ... it's so loud that you can't really hear conversation at all anymore. Part of you wants to crawl to the doorway and look down because it's a once in a lifetime view ... to look at the world the way God does. Another part of you wants to go sit in the pilot's lap or wrap yourself around the black box and kick anyone who tries to move you."

She smiles now.

I continue. "If you're lucky, you get to jump first because you're pretty sure you're a screamer and if you are ... it stands to reason that there may be others. And if you hear it, you may lose what little is left of your nerve. So, you'd rather be the first fool to scream than the last fool who can't because you've screamed with everyone else and you're done. When your partner stands in the doorway ... you're actually dangling out of it and it feels like the air is going to crush you before you can jump and right when you think you can't breathe ... they push off and away from the plane and you plummet so fast that you feel like you're going to hit the earth any second. You're weightless. You're soaring. You're falling, but you're not stumbling. And as fast as you descend, you climb. You hear the parachute and it yanks you upward, feeling like a dull hook around your middle.

"And then you float. Your brain has released about a million chemicals and you feel strong enough to reach out and break a cloud with your bare hands, but there's a delicacy that you give in to as you drift in the breeze. It feels like an eternity before you see your target and you know that you're gonna land soon. Amazing things happen. You realize that you can hear people on the ground, you can hear dogs barking, and horns blowing and the reality hits you that as much as you dreaded leaving land ... you feel even worse about walking on the ground and not the air. You brace for impact and you close your eyes, then you open them because you actually hope to survive, and then it's over. Your wings are clipped and you wonder if there has ever been another time that you felt so alive."

"Okay, I get it. I'm sorry I missed it." She picks up her glass and takes a sip. "I'll never say no again."

"Really?"

"I swear."

I couldn't have timed it better if I had to. I would swear that the waiter was standing on the other side of the screen, waiting patiently with his silver platter. He stands next to our table, holding said tray in both hands. Erica looks from him back to me. We've already had dessert and I clear my throat. "What you ruined today, Yellow, was something pretty important. Because jumping out of an airplane is the only thing I have that can show you what I felt like when I fell in love with you. Your first time jumping from a plane was going to be like my first time with you, but I'll have to hope that you understand it enough to understand this."

I motion at the waiter and he takes the lid off the tray, exposing a medium sized blue box. I take it off the tray and wait for him to leave us. Erica's impossibly expressive eyes are stuck to me in a way they've never been and I realize that I'm shaking when I say, "I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I want to spend the best days with you and the worst days with you. I want to wake up with you until I can't wake up again because that's the only way I won't have any regrets." A tear rolls down her face, causing me to give up one of my own. "I just want to be with you until I can't be."

"Callie-"

"Hush." I open the box and show her the diamond and ruby watch inside. It matches her ring. It matches us. "The only thing that's forever ... is time. It's guaranteed. There are sixty minutes in every hour and twenty four hours in every day and that's never going to change. I can't tell you how many times you'll watch the hands move around the face of this watch, but I can tell you that I want to be there for every second of it. You already got the rings, Erica, and we're already wearing them. And I know it won't mean anything to anyone but us, but I want you to marry me. Maybe it is just a worthless piece of paper, but it's a worthless piece of paper with our names and we'll know we did it."

I reach out and unfasten the simple silver watch that she wears on her wrist. I was with her when she picked it out at Macy's. I set it on the table and take the new watch from the box, meeting her eyes. "I know it's unconventional to give someone a watch, but -"

"Yes."

"Yes it's unconventional or yes -"

She holds her arm up, grinning through her tears. "Yes, I'll marry you."

I can suddenly empathize with anyone who has done this before me. I don't know whether to cry, pee my pants, hug her, or leap into my chair like Tom Cruise on Oprah to scream that she said yes. The fact that I'm thinking about Tom Cruise at all only proves how fucking sincere I am when I say that I feel faint, like I'm going to fall out any second. I somehow manage to secure the watch on her wrist and take a moment to enjoy the way it looks against her skin and the way she gazes down at it with so much love that it's like an extension of me ... and then I burst into tears.

"Oh, Callie. It's okay, baby."

She pulls me into her arms and hangs onto me, rubbing my back. I can feel that she has joined me in my mental breakdown because her breath is hitching just as much as mine. I fleetingly think that it's a damn shame that she's messing up her perfect eyeliner, but then I realize that I will probably come out of this thing looking like Amy Winehouse after a four day bender and give in. It's Erica's lips on my neck that calm me down. I don't know what I was more scared of ... her saying no or me not being able to spit the words out. Either way, I don't think I've ever terrorized myself quite so thoroughly and when she pulls my head up, forcing me to look at her, I have to smile through my tears. "You said yes."

"Did you doubt it!?" she asks, scandalized.

"Well, shit, you've said no to everything else today."

"That's overstating."

I rub my nose against hers, then we kiss. It starts out as a sweet, thankful peck, but it quickly escalates. Most of our kisses do that so it really shouldn't take me by surprise, but it always does. I've kissed many people in my life and every one of those kisses feels meaningless in comparison. There's a difference as vast as the ocean between kissing someone out of lust and kissing someone because your soul pushes you forward and rubs against someone else's. Our breath mingles, caressing our skin, our lips rub and tantalize, and our hands move up, grasping. She cradles my face the same way I cradle hers and I know that we're both holding on to keep from soaring away. We pull apart because we're on a roof and my hand is dangerously close to diving into the neck of her dress.

She picks up her napkin, rubbing it against my cheek. When she's wiped it clear, she kisses my forehead. "This is undoubtedly the best day of my life. It was perfect. Thank you for this, Cal. For being you."

"I'm just a reflection of you."

"No, I could never be that pretty." She tucks my hair behind my ear, tracing my lobe. "I love you. And I don't have to jump out of an airplane to experience what you described because that's what you do to me every single time you touch me."

"Well, if we get out of here ... I think I can make you fly."

She nods at me and I retrieve my credit card from the leather holder. I dig through my wallet in search of cash for the tip, but she beats me to it and leaves more than enough. I scowl at her and she says, "Engaged rule number one," and holds up a finger, "we'll make money decisions together from now so I really think this is the last time we'll eat at a place like this."

"What would you prefer?"

"I've heard the 'Y' has really good food."

I choke on my wine and nod, getting to my feet. The staff, who exceeded anything I've experienced in America, fall over themselves to speak to us as we leave the restaurant. Because we're not alone in the elevator, we're reduced to having eye sex again in the shiny doors. I feel thoroughly dirty when they slide open and we retrieve our purses from the safe. It's late and I fight hard not to yawn as we walk down the street hand in hand. It would be so easy to pull her into one of the numerous alleys and get a good look at the underwear I picked out for her, but I really don't know the Italian laws well enough to try it.

"Mi scusi! Mi Scusi! Excuse me! Ladies! Please!"

Fearing the worst ... that Italy has a Savoy, I stop walking and turn around with lead in my belly. A young man is standing there, looking like the perfect stereotype of a starving artist. His black toboggan is splattered with paint and the sweater he wears is threadbare in spots. He points to a well lit area, just under a glowing street lamp, and holds up a canvas. I hear Erica gasp at the same time that I do. There are no words for it. This man, this sidewalk artist, has painted the two of us locked in a kiss, our hands on each other's faces. I put my hand over my heart to keep from reaching out and touching it. "Oh ... my god."

He smiles. "You like?"

"It's beautiful," Erica says, drawn forward to see the detail, to see us captured in oil. "I've never ... you painted her so perfectly."

"Is my gift. Please." His accent is thick, hard to understand. He holds the canvas out, indicating with his head that she should take it. "Is you."

"You have to let us pay you," I tell him, opening my clutch. I'd happily go broke to own what he's offering.

"No no no!" He shakes his head emphatically. "I give you. No money for me. Take. I look all day for something to paint and I see love. Is good. My gift."

"Thank you. It's stunning, really."

"I paint while you eat," he says, pointing back toward the bistro we had lunch at. "I fear you are lost to me and I no give for you the gift, but I see you now. So please, is gift."

Erica accepts the painting because he thrusts it at her. She handles it the way you'd handle the Mona Lisa. "Really, this is so generous, but we'd be happy to pay you and -"

"Yes," I agree. "It's too much, really."

"No too much," he says. He takes a business card out of his pocket and holds it out to me. "You send me email, yes? Photograph with ... a ... a frame. Please?"

"Absolutely." I look down at the name on the card. "Giuseppe, I'm Callie and this is Erica."

He nods, taking off his toboggan and then he throws up his hand, bows in front of us, and scurries off the way we just came. Erica looks down at his breathtaking rendering of us, then glances left and right. "Maybe it's the American in me that's paranoid, but let's go."

We power walk to the limo and clamber inside. She spreads the painting over the seat and we both stare at it, then at each other. I'm sure we have a million comments to make about our treasure, but it has to wait. We're on each other instantly and we both struggle for dominance ... I finally win and shove her skirt over her head. Her red panties are EXACTLY like her blue ones. I logged many unproductive hours looking at panties online while I was suffering through my sunburn. And I finally found them. You bet your sweet ass I ordered three of every color except the blue. I think I ordered ten of those. I lean down and kiss her stomach, then let my tongue move under the waist band. She hisses and tugs my hair and as slowly as I dare, I pull the lacy thong down with my teeth. When I stuff them in my purse and return to her ... I waste no time indulging in her nectar.

The ride to the helicopter doesn't take nearly long enough, but she has gotten off and is a hair's breadth from getting me off when we stop. I hear the driver open his door and the gravel crunch under his feet and close my eyes, trying to will myself to come. Her tongue slides against me and I hold my breath, anticipating being caught in the act ... because I'm not stopping. It doesn't happen. Before the driver can pull the handle, Erica springs forward and locks the door, yelling, "Just a minute!"

She returns to me and gently slides two fingers into my wet passage. My eyes roll back, my toes curl in my heels, and when her tongue circles my clit ... I cry out my release and she kisses me fast, but it's not enough to silence it. I'm sure there's no doubt what we're doing. It takes me a while to get myself under control and when I finally climb out of the backseat ...I stumble all over the place. She hangs onto me, thanking the driver and offering him a tip, but he declines.

I don't know what I was thinking when I didn't insist on changing back into our comfortable clothes. We bundle our skirts around us and attempt to get comfortable in the helicopter, but it's going to be torture and we both know it. It's hot, humid, and confining. Erica has carefully spread the painting over her lap and I can see her looking at it in the moonlight. I put my head against her shoulder and say, "How many people can say they have an oil painting of the day they got engaged?"

"We can." She puts her cheek against the top of my head. "I am going to blindly trust you from now on. I'm not going to argue with you over where we're going."

"Can I get that in writing?"

She laughs, nudging me with her shoulder. "You did it."

I sit up and look at her. The moon is hanging outside her window, bathing her in its milky glow. "What'd I do?"

"You showed me the world."

Silhouetted against the halo of light, she looks like an angel. She looks exactly like the blond haired angel that Jasper used to put on top of our Christmas tree. Even the angel wore a red robe the way she's wearing her red dress.

I may have showed her the world. I may have given her something that she never ever dreamed of in her trailer growing up.

But she's given me a glimpse of Heaven.

And turned me into a believer.


	25. Chapter 25

"Callie?"

Sleep. Sleep is the only thing I can think of and I'm clinging to it despite the persistent shaking on my leg. I have never been less inclined to wake up in my life. There was just enough wine before bed to knock me out and I truly hope to stay that way for a good ten hours. To prove my point, I move my leg and make a warning sound in the back of my throat that says 'Do not poke the caged tiger' as I roll away from Erica and snuggle under the cover. I'm back in the delirium, floating toward peaceful sleep when Erica shakes me again, this time a little harder, this time with her hand on my shoulder. "Please," I mumble. "Unless you are dying, bleeding, or in some kind of pain ... do not tempt fate."

"Wake up."

"What time is it?"

"Just after six."

I lift my head and look toward the window. "IN THE MORNING!?"

"Yeah."

"That's three hours of sleep, Erica! Good night!"

Blessed silence, peaceful calm, and my head is cushioned just right on the pillow. I'm so comfortable, so calm, so sated that I could fall back to sleep with no problem. I had been dreaming of Miami. Jasper, Erica, and I were standing on the beach holding hands and he was telling me, not in his broken voice, but in a strong, manly one, that he was going to be having surgery soon. Erica asked him if he was scared and he replied, 'No. I'm ready'. I had just asked him if he was going to come back to me and he had replied, 'I never left', when I woke up. I want to get back into that dream. I want to look at my brother for a little while longer and listen to him talk because something tells me I'll be hanging from his every word in the near future. I'm close ... I'm ever so close to the peaceful calm right before sleep claims you ... when Erica shakes me again. I don't know what will kill me first ... exhaustion or aggravation. "Whaaaaaat?" I whine. Yeah, there you have it. I whine the word, carrying it out like a two year old.

"You asked me to marry you."

"Don't make me take it back."

"Callie, you asked me to marry you."

My back is still to her, but something in her voice forces my eyes open. My eyelids are heavy and I can't stop the big, loud yawn that roars through me, but I roll over to face her. Rubbing my eyes, I say, "Yes, I did."

There's nothing but silence so I stop rubbing and attempt to focus, but her face swims in an out of focus. Yes, I'm that tired. I'm the kind of tired that you get from a thirty hour shift when you finally hit the on call room because you can't possibly make it to your apartment. I'm sure my eyes are bloodshot because they're stinging so much. I finally dab at them with the sheet and get the watering under control. When I look at her again, she's got a strange expression on her face. She's nervously worrying her bottom lip with her teeth which is a sure sign that she's got something to say, but because she's looking at the ceiling, I can't really get a bead on what she's thinking. "Erica?"

"You asked me to marry you and I said yes."

She doesn't look like she's slept at all. Her eyes are wide and a little ball of fear rolls through my stomach, burning it. "You're not allowed to change your mind."

She turns to face me, tucking the cover around herself and settling in. Oh god. It's obviously going to be a long talk. "For two days, Cal, ... I was absolutely horrible to you and you still asked me to marry you."

She's thinking of the fact that we locked horns over her mortgage and again over skydiving. How anyone think after a day like we had yesterday is beyond me. My body is just now coming to grips with the helicopter ride, aching and throbbing in bad, bad places. "You apologized. Everything's fine, Yellow. Let's go back to sleep."

"It shouldn't be that easy. I shouldn't be allowed to lose my temper like that and then just apologize and ... get proposed to."

"I won't be asking again so -"

"I'm not joking, Callie. This is serious."

I feel like someone injected me with a sleeping pill and it's a struggle to remain conscious, despite the subject matter at hand. I close my eyes as my body desperately tries to shut down so it takes me a second to locate her arm. I fumble around for it, then pat it a few times. "Shhh. It's okay."

"Can you please wake up and talk to me!?"

"I will. In about four hours. We'll talk all you want, baby, but right now -"

"How can you sleep at all?!" she demands. "We need to have a discussion and I can't wait. I've been up all night."

I concede defeat and sit up, arranging my pillows against the headboard. Crossing my arms over my chest, I lean back. "Okay. Let's talk."

"Your body language says that you aren't very receptive right now."

"No. The fact that the sun is not up yet says that I'm not very receptive. What's on your mind?"

"Did I upset you really bad by not jumping?"

"Not really bad ... just kind of bad."

Erica is the kind of person who isn't afraid to go toe to toe with the devil. She'll speak her peace, bump heads, and get ugly if she has to, but she is never one to bite her tongue. I can almost see her doing that now. Her bottom jaw moves just a little and her pursed lips twitch as she tucks her hands under her cheek and gazes up at me. I give her a look that makes it clear that I'm waiting and she finally sighs and nods, more for herself than me, I think. I listen to her clear her throat before she says, "Don't love me so much that you let me walk all over you. If I yell at you ... yell back. If I'm acting like a bitch then call me on it and stand up to me because I'll hurt you if you don't. It's who I am. I'm ... hard around the edges and I'm ... mean. So, don't give me the power to do that."

"You woke me up before it should be legal to tell me this?"

"I woke you up because I can't sleep with this thing on my mind. What you did yesterday ... after I was so hard on you ... I didn't deserve it."

"I'm glad I did it, Erica. I love you. I meant what I said." I rub my hand over my face. I need coffee. Or an IV full of adrenalin. The mental exhaustion from yesterday is going to drive me insane if I don't sleep it off. "You apologized. I accepted. It's done."

"I feel like you do so much for me and I don't pay it back. I feel like -"

"Oh my god! If you're going to have a girl freak out ... could you please do it when I've rested enough to handle it?"

"Why would you want to spend the rest of your life with someone who yells at you for trying to do something nice for them?"

"To keep my life interesting?"

"You're not helping." She brushes a wrinkle off the quilt, then rolls onto her back, gazing at nothing. "I just hate to think that I let you down."

"You didn't."

"And you didn't even argue with me about it. You just ... accepted it."

I lean down and kiss her shoulder, resting my hand on her stomach. "The reason I didn't argue with you is because I pick and choose my battles. I wanted you on the roof of that building more than I wanted to make you jump out of a plane. If I had pissed you off too much ... you wouldn't have gone with me."

"So you just pretend that I wasn't a world class bitch?"

"Erica."

"What?"

She meets my eyes and I smile at her. "I have two theories ... you have either gone crazy from lack of sleep or you're freaking out over saying yes. Which is it?"

"I'd never freak out over agreeing to be happy for the rest of my life."

That's possibly the sweetest thing she's ever said to me. My smile widens as I give her a soft kiss. "I make you happy, huh?"

"I'm really sorry about everything. I wish I had done it differently." She pushes my hair off my cheek and studies my face. "I had a great time. Everything ... it was perfect."

"Yeah ... it was. Want to thank me again?" I push the cover down a little, tracing her nipple. "Because nothing says thank you like -"

She yawns, covering her mouth. "Can I thank you in about six hours?"

My eyes widen in shock. "You have got to be KIDDING me! You woke me up! We should make the most of it!"

"We're having a conversation."

"Ugh."

To drive home the point that I am definitely not getting a physical show of gratitude, she rolls away from me and tugs me against her, inviting me to spoon against her back. I rest my head next to hers on the pillow and resign myself to the fact that sex is not happening. It's just as well, I suppose. I do want to be able to walk and if she spends any more time with my legs over her shoulders it may be difficult. She laces our fingers together and says, "Do you remember that night you came to my house to talk to me and ... I had company?"

I stiffen involuntarily. "You don't generally forget something that traumatic."

"I stayed awake all night. I tried to call you, but your phone was off and I contemplated driving to your apartment, but I couldn't bring myself to face you. I was so fucking ... guilty. I felt guilty as hell even though we weren't a couple. I'll never forget the look on your face when you realized that I wasn't alone." She tightens her grip on my hand. "I saw that look again for a second yesterday in the helicopter. You were staring at that castle out my window and when you looked at me ... you were so damn sad, so defeated. You had done this amazing thing for me and you thought I didn't appreciate it. Just like you thought I didn't want you that night when she -"

"Let's change the subject."

She glances at me over her shoulder. "I cried that night until I was sick as a dog. I did that a lot because of you. When we got back from Miami? I was drunk for four days and then I tried to resign and Richard wouldn't accept it because I was intoxicated when I called him."

"You tried to resign!?"

"Yeah, Callie, I did. I was devastated. I had fallen in love and had this clear picture in my head of how I wanted my life to be and suddenly it wasn't happening. I wanted to get as far away from you as I could before I had to see you again. I was humiliated, devastated, broken. And so fucking miserable that I couldn't breathe. I knew you'd come back to work and be with him right in front of me and I wanted to leave."

I get it now. The way that I felt when I realized that Helen was in Erica's house is the exact same way she felt when I left the airport with Mark ... when I hung around with him at work. For so long, I've held onto my anger at her for moving on, for finding someone else, but I did it first. Even though I never let Mark in all the way, I still let him linger and that was a slap in her face ... no ... it was a beating. "I'm glad you didn't go."

"I had my therapist on speed dial because of you."

When someone shares something like that with you ... you really can't reply. You can't apologize for it, you can't make amends for it, you can't do anything except hug the person a little tighter and hang on for dear life. And feel really, really small. I went wrong with her twelve million ways. I hurt her more than anyone should be hurt and I let her down after making her live in the world that I was offering, then snatched away. I'm not sleepy now. I'm miserable and depressed and absolutely horrified that she nearly walked completely out of my life for good. I slip away from her and sit up, running my hands through my hair. "You probably think I have a lot of nerve asking you to marry me after what I put you through."

The bed shifts and she pulls me into her arms, rising to her knees in front of me. "Mostly I think it fucking sucks that you beat me to the punch because I had a plan, too."

I lift my head, stunned. "What?"

She nods, giving me the crooked grin that gives her a dimple in her chin. "I didn't really wake you up because I wanted to talk."

"Excellent. Then we are making out?"

"Are you going to look down at your hand at some point?"

I do just that and I can't believe what I see. She has put a yellow diamond ring on my finger while I slept. It's square, surrounded by smaller diamonds, and it looks perfect with my eternity band. Gasping, I lift my hand and run my thumb over it. It's not obscenely large, but it's definitely not small and very easily explains why she was juggling her finances. I've never seen anything like it and I can't stop looking at it either. If I were going to design the perfect ring for me ... this would be it. And to think that she had it with her all along ... I could die. "Erica-"

"Look, nothing I attempt to do is going to top what you did for me so I'm not even going to try." She lifts my hand and kisses it. "What I will say ... is that I was going to ask you when the time felt right and watching you sleep, hearing you breathe ... that felt right."

She was going to propose to me. Shit. I could have saved myself a few gray hairs and a case of nerves by leaving it up to her! Nah ... I really couldn't have. I had to do it. I had to prove to myself that I still believe in marriage, but even more than that ... I had to make sure she knows how I feel. As I gaze down at my ring, though, I know that she can't possibly feel the way I feel in this moment. I can only shake my head in shock, torn between being amazed and mortified. Mortification wins out. "Oh my god. I gave you a watch."

"I don't like rings and you know it. This is the most I can do." She holds up her hand, where her ruby band is glinting beautifully in the lamplight. "Besides ... what you said to me is priceless."

I don't bother telling her that I gave her a Rolex and wasn't actually comparing the value.

Who knew that the woman who inducted me into a life I never really knew existed could be a traditionalist?

She does very, very untraditional things to me as the sun rises.

I don't think about sleep at all.

Rule number one of horseback riding:

Don't fall off.

Don't fall off because I lack the filter that tells me not to laugh at you and that's exactly what I do to Erica when she attempts to dismount, gets her foot tangled, and falls on her ass with one foot still in the stirrup. Her horse, who seems to have accepted her inability, compensates for her shortcomings by standing very still. I see his eyes move toward her as he snorts once and it's him more that her that makes me double over on my own horse and laugh until my sides ache. When I collect myself and sit up, she's dusting her pants off and glaring at me.

"This?" she says, wiping sweat off her brow. "Is not fun."

"I bet jumping out of a plane looks pretty damn good right about now, huh?"

"Bring that up again and I'm going to make you cry."

"How?"

"No sex? You'll die."

"Have hand. Will use."

She scowls at me and plucks her canteen off the saddle. I watch her take a few sips and slide off my own horse. He's midnight black and keeps trying to run with me. I can't run him because I don't want to leave her and Necromancer, my horse, takes offense to that by nipping me on the shoulder when I walk in front of him. It's been too long since I've ridden, I think. My ass is sore, my thighs are aching, and my spine feels like it's cracked from supporting my back for hours. And I've never been bitten by a horse. I yelp, more from shock that pain, and she laughs now, pointing at me. "Ha ha."

I rub my shoulder and move out of Necromancer's way. He ignores me and walks toward a babbling stream, head down. Her horse, Andromeda, follows him and they noisily lap at the water. I'd like to submerge myself, but that's not happening. The jeans I'm wearing are already sticking to me and we have a good hour ride back to Claudine's farm. My t-shirt feels like it's been soaked with warm water as well and the effect is akin to walking in the dessert with a wet wool sweater on. I fan my shirt and say, "This wasn't the best idea I've had."

"Well ... no."

I flip her a bird and she grabs my finger, biting it. We're so fucking cute it makes me want to vomit.

Under a copse of shade trees, we eat oranges while the horses graze and she says, "Do you know what?"

"No," I reply. "What?"

"The first time I saw you ... I was at Seattle Grace to operate on Harold O'Malley and you walked past me and I could smell cherry blossoms and I watched you until you rounded the corner and disappeared." She leans her head back against a tree trunk and watches me bite into a piece of fruit. "I wanted to ask who you were, but I didn't."

"I saw you, too." I tell her, wiping juice off my chin. "You had on red scrubs and I remember thinking that you looked good, bad ass."

"That day that I asked you and Mark out for drinks ... I was really asking you."

"I noticed you didn't give him the time of day."

"And he lost interest fast. When that little nurse prissed across the room ... he was more than happy to follow her." Erica finishes off her orange and rubs her hand on her pants. "I was sad to see that night come to an end, really. I had never laughed so hard."

"Me either." I nudge her with my shoulder. "Seeing you the next day in the elevator ... I was a little nervous. I didn't know why then, but I think ... I think I knew that I was attracted to you and I didn't know what to do with that."

"I knew that I was attracted to you. I could hear you laugh from across the room and my entire body would react. I hated it, too. Because the last thing I needed to do was fall for a 'straight girl' who-"

"I think I've proven that I'm not all that straight."

She laughs. "Our first time together in Miami ... I think I was more scared than you were."

"I find that hard to believe."

"I only had one chance of showing you what it was like to be with a woman. If I had screwed it up and you hated it ... well, that was on me."

"I was a virgin. Nothing can touch virgin fear."

She shakes her head. "You really didn't act like one. A lot of women ... they won't ... go down the first time. That's something that ... well, some women have to work up to that and -"

"I wanted to make you feel the way you made me feel." I take another bite of orange and chew it slowly, remembering the day in question. "I was actually shocked at how ... natural it felt. The first time I had sex with a guy it was awful, but it was something completely different with you. It was like touching you ... tasting you ... I had waited my whole life to do that."

"Were you attracted to girls growing up?"

"No, but I did have a dirty dream about Angelina Jolie after watching Tomb Raider." I shrug apologetically. "This may sound weird ... but I don't think that you being a woman is what attracted me to you. I think the fact that you're YOU and you're everything I could want in a person is what made me fall in love with you."

"When did you know that you had feelings for me?"

"I knew something was there, but when Addison assumed that we were a couple it started to click. I started to really think about you in a different way, but honestly ... I think it clicked in my head all the way when we were on the beach in Miami and you told me about your family. The second you started to cry and I put my arms around you ... I never wanted to let go." My hand is sticky when I take hers but she doesn't seem to mind. "What about you? When did you know?"

"I was definitely attracted to you because you were a woman, but I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt when you trusted me to operate on your dad. The way you trusted me, the way you believed in me, the way you needed me ... I knew I wanted to take care of you the same way you asked me to take care of him." She leans her head against my shoulder. "I knew going into it that you were going to hurt me ... but I didn't have a choice. I couldn't control it."

"You knew I would hurt you?"

She nods. "The morning after ... when you were trying to out swim your demons in the water ... I was sitting there thinking that I couldn't keep up with you. I was thinking how foolish it was to fall in love with somebody who wasn't sure and how much it was going to hurt me if you decided that I wasn't for you, but it didn't matter. I think I would have let you kill me if it meant that I could be with you until the end."

"I never wanted -"

"I know. Me either." She takes a deep breath and lifts her head. "I hurt you back. In that motel room when you came back from Jasper's birthday party ... I hurt you even worse, I think."

I close my eyes, remembering the cruel, hateful things she said to me as she roughly dug her fingers into my unwilling flesh. We've never really discussed it. "Why did you do that?"

"I wanted to hate you. I was desperate to hate you and have you hate me because loving you hurt too much. I thought ... I thought if I could make us both angry enough to walk away then maybe we'd ... survive it." Her eyes meet mine and she shakes her head. "I thought that breaking you would make me feel better, but it didn't."

"I could tell." I run my hand over her cheek before I give her a kiss. "I'm glad we finally got it right."

"So am I, baby. So am I."

On the ride back to the main house ... the heavens open up and enough rain falls to rival Seattle in a year. Okay, maybe that's a stretch, but it feels like it. It's a welcome relief in the blaring sun, too. Two stable boys greet us and take care of our horses as we hop back into our Smart Car and go back to the cottage. Our clothing is so wet that it's a joint effort to get them off, which is technically kind of fun. We shower, which takes a very, very long time and then the power goes out. It's just like Miami ... all over again. Erica lights candles while I grab the bottle of wine we had been cooling in the refrigerator. When I join her in the bedroom, almost every surface is covered in flickering candles and it's beautiful. She's beautiful when she turns to look at me, blowing out the match as she does.

This is the person that I've chosen to spend the rest of my life with. I guess, when it comes right down to it ... being with her is a choice and I chose wisely. I love everything from cowlick she has trouble taming to the way her feet look a little too big because of her skinny ankles. I love her sense of humor, her smile, the way she calls me on my shit before I can really even start anything ... and most of all ... I love the way she loves me. It doesn't matter if you're gay, straight, bi ... or whatever ... when you choose wisely ... the world is suddenly a better place and all that matters is that in a sea of millions ... there's one person who rides life with you. There's one person who looks at you the same way you look at them.

She holds out her hand and opens the bottle (this is due in large part to the fact that I shot her in the ass with the cork the last time I opened one) and we toast to nothing and everything. When she inclines her head toward the bed, I set my glass down on the dresser and step up onto the first step beside it. I feel her hands on my hips and turn, smiling down at her. My breasts are level with her mouth and she takes her time, tasting one, then the other. There's this thing she does with her tongue when she's between my legs that I haven't quite figured out, but as I watch her lap at my nipple ... I figured it out. She pressed her tongue flat against it, then undulates, rolling it and the breath catches in my throat. I can't wait to try that move on her. I can't take my eyes off her when she moves to my ribcage and my hand goes into her hair when she bites my hip, sucking hard enough to leave a hickey.

I don't mind.

When she pulls away and whispers, "Lie down" ... I comply, but I'm shaking when I climb the second step and trip over my own lust.

She chuckles and waits for me to roll onto my back, which I do instantly so I can keep my eye on her. She kisses my ankle as she climbs up the steps, then my calf, then my knee. I hold my breath when her tongue runs up the inside of my thigh, but she doesn't stop at my center. Instead, she skips over it and traces down my other thigh, kissing my knee, then my ankle. When she runs her fingertips over the sole of my foot I jerk away and shake my head ... I nearly have to be sedated just to get a pedicure. She grins devilishly and reaches for my other foot, but I'm too quick for her. I sit up and grab her around the waist, pulling her on top of me. For a while, she looks at me with such intensity that I don't know what she's thinking. One hand smoothes my hair back from my face, spreading it over the pillow, while the other supports her weight. Finally, I can't take it. "Erica?"

"The only thing that compares to being here with you ... in Italy ... is being at home with you. I don't have to go on vacation with you to feel like I've been somewhere amazing. You take me somewhere new every day."

"Get out of my head," I tell her. "I was thinking the exact same thing the other day."

She smiles and the hand that was sliding through my hair makes a slow descent down my body. She barely brushes against my center and I react instantly, hissing. She captures my mouth in hers before I can say anything ... not that I was going to. Not that I could. It's so hard to string words into sentences when someone is touching you with so much skill that they know every nerve to hit, every button to push, every spot that makes you squirm. Her hand is enough ... it's always enough ... but when she starts to move down my body for a taste, I grab her arm and shake my head. I twirl my finger so that she understands what I want and she turns, her hand never leaving me. It's so much easier to do sixty nine on a large bed. As she lowers herself over my face, I reach up and guide her, my fingers digging into her backside.

She said that some women don't do this at first ... my answer to that is WHY!?

You don't know the joy of being with a woman until you let her dangle from your mouth and smile against her most intimate places. I feel her do just that to me when I tell her to do 'it' again. The 'it' in question is that tongue trick and when I do it back to her ... she nearly collapses on top of me. I'm nothing if not a quick study. This? This is the good life and when I slide my fingers into her and listen to the sounds she makes ... I know that what we came through isn't nearly as important as where we're going.

The past is the past.

The future ... is ours.

The rest of our time in Italy flies by.

I talk Erica into jet skiing again, but her arms feel too good around me to do a three sixty and throw her into the water. She spends far too much time slathering me with sunblock and not nearly enough time naughty touching me under the water when we wade out, but it's still fun. We visit the market again, this time on a quest for souvenirs for friends and family and we finally see the Medieval Torture Museum she mentioned. She loves it. I don't. I may have mentioned that my threshold for pain is non-existent and just looking at the different contraptions kept me up all night (but it was not wasted time ... if you catch my drift). Days come and go at lightning speed, but we don't rush to overfill them. We leisurely walk through every hour instead of running into the next and soak up enough of the culture and the people to carry Italy in our souls for ... well ... ever.

Our best day (engagement notwithstanding) is spent with Claudine, learning how to make wine. We pick grapes all morning, smash them with our feet, and then watch the process from start to finish. Claudine takes a photograph of us in our aprons, our purple feet bare, and then presents us with a bottle that boasts our image on the label. It could be my favorite souvenir thus far ... unless you count the ring on my finger. From what I can tell, wine making is a lucrative business because there are plenty of employees and so much state of the art equipment that my mind boggles. Looking at Claudine, with her wiry, masculine build and raggedy clothing, you'd think she was scraping together everything to make ends meet, but that's not the case. She's like me, I think. Money is more fun when you spend it on other people.

To thank Claudine for letting us stay at her Abbey, showing us her business, and staining our pedicures, Erica invites her to dinner and we're shocked when she arrives with a guest. Her companion is easily approaching her seventies and the walker she uses has plenty of dings and scratches, telling me that she moves around a lot, despite her limitations. Her snowy white hair is artfully curled, flowing long over her shoulders, and her big, brown eyes are crinkled around the edges when she greets me. There's something about the liver spots on her face and the undiluted kindness in her smile that speaks of wisdom. She's wise, this one. There's a depth to her that you can see without looking for it and I know before she speaks that a person could sit at her feet and take notes on life ... and come out better for it.

"This is Angie," says Claudine, taking her floppy hat off and hanging it over the coat rack. Her hair, silver and blond, has been slicked back into a crooked ponytail. "She never misses a chance to get out of the house."

"Hi, Angie," I say, holding out my hand. "I'm Callie."

The old woman clutches my hand in her own gnarled one and nods at me. "I know which one you are. Claude painted a lovely mental image of you two."

Her accent is not nearly as thick as most of the ones Erica and I have encountered on our vacation, but it's still there, still lilting her words around the edges. I introduce Erica, who shakes her hand as well, and then we sit down in the living room while we wait for dinner. It's odd to find yourself entertaining someone in their house. Granted, it's a rental, but it's still peculiar and I'm suddenly self conscious of the open suitcase in the corner of the living room that Erica's been slowly packing. My things are spilling out of it because I couldn't find a decent shirt earlier. I'm messy, but I don't want anyone to actually SEE that I'm messy. I listen as Angie quizzes Erica about Seattle and the old woman seems to hang on every word, asking for details about Pike Place and Seattle Grace. She finally sets her rheumy eyes on me and says, "How do you like my country? Has Italy been nice for you?"

"It's been amazing," I reply, grinning. "It's so beautiful here."

"You found peace, yes?" Angie asks.

"Definitely," I assure her. "And we needed it."

Erica reaches over and takes my hand, squeezing it. "Yes ... we did."

Claudine puts her wine glass down on the table and says, "It's still not accepted very easily in the States, is it? Same sex couples?"

"Not like it should be," Erica tells her. "We've been called our fair share of names and it seems like every time you turn on the television someone's protesting gay marriage or holding up a sign to tell us that God hates us."

"Your parents," Angie says, looking at me. "Do they accept you?"

I think maybe it's because she's so old that I don't mind such personal questions. Or maybe it's because I have a sinking suspicion that I'm looking at a living, breathing mirror and she has probably walked several hundred miles in my shoes. Or maybe I'm walking in hers now. "My father does. He has no problem with us being together, but my mother ... she's hurt. She doesn't understand."

Claudine shakes her head. "Mothers can be our best friends or our worst enemies."

Angie nudges her with her shoulder. "Our children would never say that about me."

Claudine puts an arm around her, looking mischievous. "That's because you only ever played good cop bad cop with me."

Erica and I exchange amused expressions and I say, "So ... how did the two of you meet?"

"My family invited hers for our annual wine tasting fair," Angie says, patting the other woman on the leg. "And she was dirty, dressed in pants, and didn't have one iota of table manners. Why, she belched right in front of me and I almost fainted."

"You were so damn uppity, you deserved it," Claudine shoots back. "Good God, it was the middle of summer and she had lace up to her chin, dainty little gloves on, and stockings so thick you couldn't even see her ankle bone through them. She didn't even have the gumption to break a sweat and I was sitting there boiling."

"It takes quite a bit of energy to force your body to make so many uncouth noises, Claude."

"It takes even more to be so damned proper." With a toothy grin, Claudine reaches up and rubs the curls over Angie's shoulder. "I touched her hair like this, though, in the kitchen and she slapped me as hard as she could. I was as shocked as a person could be. I'd never been struck before and I definitely didn't think such a girly little thing could pack such a punch."

"I'd never had anyone touch me so brazenly, either," Angie interjected. The two women laugh at the memory and Erica and I have to join in. I can picture it in my head. Tomboyish Claudine and lady like Angie, trading barbs and blows over the dinner dishes. The affection between them is obvious and it gives me hope, makes me want to strive toward what they have. It makes me want to sit next to Erica when she's gray and I'm probably not because there will always be Miss Clairol ... but share our story with someone, too. "The little jackass," Angie continues, turning her chocolate eyes on me, "decided to remain in Italy and fooled my neighbor into thinking she was a boy. I didn't find out right away. I kept hearing about 'Claude', who was so strong and so fast when it came to picking grapes that no one could compare. I even heard that Claude had challenged old Gus Angelo, the biggest bully in town, to a fight and won. I had to see if for myself and -"

"No, you wanted to come and lure me to your parent's farm if I was really that talented."

"Well, when I saw who it was ... I certainly changed my mind." Angie scowls at her partner, then closes her eyes at the memory. "This fool had cut off all her hair and was running circles around the men, cracking her knuckles and acting like a mongrel. I took one look at her and yelled at the top of my lungs."

"What did you yell?" Erica asks, chuckling.

"Well, of course I yelled that she was a low down, good for nothing girl." Angie laughs. "And Claude threw her basket of grapes in the air and took off running."

"Why did you run?" I query, shocked that Claudine would turn down the opportunity to stand her ground.

"It was a different time back then, honey," Claudine replies. "Women had their place, men had theirs, and I had violated that and blurred the lines. I had lived in their workhouse, saw them scratching their hairy asses, and listened to them talk about despicable things. If they had caught me ... why, there's no telling what they would've done to me."

Angie nods in agreement. "And I felt so damn guilty for doing it that I chased after her, ripped my new dress that was -"

"All the way from Paris, France," Claudine supplies. "Which I still hear about."

"And then," Angie plows on, undaunted. "I offered her a job at my father's winery and let them all think that she was a boy. Because her hair was massacred and she stayed so dirty, my parents didn't realize who she was. I should've told on her, though."

The timer goes off in the kitchen and Erica and I get the table set. The Hawaiian Chicken is well received and after Angie gushes about the flavors for ten minutes, I say, "So, Angie, why should you have told on her?"

"The scraggly little she-devil wormed her way into my heart when I wasn't looking." Her eyes fall on Claudine, watching her with such adoration that I can barely stand it. It's amazing to see something so ... pure. It's amazing to know that Erica and I traveled so far, but still found a place that can feel like home ... and people who can show us who we can become. "Before I knew what happened to me ... I couldn't get enough of her. I spent all my time down at the winery and everybody said that I was head over heels in love, but I didn't see it right away."

"It took her father dying." Claudine talks with her mouth full of chicken. Her table manners haven't improved and I think it's so endearing that I barely notice. "And me stepping up to run the winery to make Miss Priss see me for what I was?"

"Which was?" Angie asks.

"Brilliant. Accomplished. Capable." With a twinkle in her blue eyes, Claudine adds, "And pretty damn nice to look at, despite my massacred hair."

"How did people take it?" I ask, feeling like I'm intruding on something insanely private. "When you -"

"We didn't," Claudine tells me. "Ever. We never had the big coming out party or proclaimed that we were together. We couldn't. And people around here ... if they suspect it, they never say as much. We are just two women working together in a man's world. But we've still been blessed ... our kids are -"

"Claude's brother went to prison and we took his kids when her parents asked us to." Angie's pinky is in the air when she sips her wine and I can picture her at the dinner table the first time they met. "We raised them as ours and here we are. Old, but happy. No regrets. Unless Claude regrets the fact that her hair never did grow back right after she took a blade to it."

"Nah." With a wave of her hand, Claudine dismisses the notion. "I can't even regret that. I had a good life."

"How long have you been together?" Erica inquires.

"It was fifty years last month that I met her," Angie says, finishing off her wine.

"But it wasn't official until she pulled me into the barn and had her way with me," Claudine offers. "So, it's really only forty nine years, but who's counting?"

"Claude! For heaven's sake! Such talk at the dinner table!" Angie shakes her head and I can see the spitfire that she must have been, no matter how much lace she wore. She catches me looking and says, "How about the two of you?"

"Not long enough," I tell her and listen as Erica fills in the blanks.

It'll never be long enough.

I wish I could have met Erica when I was still a teenager so that I could celebrate fifty years with her one day.

She'd have to live well into her nineties.

God ... there's never enough time.

Is there?

Claudine notices my ring during dessert and Erica and I take turns sharing our engagement story. We don't do it nearly as much justice as they did their own tale, but Angie seems to enjoy it anyway. She claps her hands together and pretends to swoon when I talk about the opera that took place below us. Claudine, who actually reminds me of Cristina now that I think about it, can only roll her eyes before she goes out back to smoke. Angie watches her go with that same look of affection that I noticed earlier.

I make a silent vow to myself that no matter what comes next ... I'll still be looking at Erica that way when I'm old, wrinkled, and weary.

I may not have fifty years, but what I do have ... I'll make sure we live to the fullest.

When Angie and Claudine leave, Erica and I clean the kitchen. We're both quiet, lost in thought as we mechanically move around each other. Finally, I run into her and she hugs me, hanging on so tight that I'm sure my ribs nearly buckle. I return the embrace just as enthusiastically and when she takes a step back, her eyes are watery. "What's wrong?" I ask.

"They have an epic love."

"I know. It's almost as good as ours, huh?"

"Let's take a walk."

"Right now?"

"Right now." She dries her soapy hands on a towel and pulls me after her. Neither of us bother with our shoes and walk barefoot across the property. The field of sunflowers look ghostly, ominous under the pale moonlight, but it doesn't stop her. We're both wearing shorts and souvenir t-shirts and I wonder if her skin is crawling as much as mine when the stalks rub against her flesh. I listen to the rustling and start to say something about bats when she stops walking and turns toward me. I can see her intention like an open book in front of me.

Apparently she took what I said about sex in the sunflower field to heart.

Because here it is.

And we're apparently doing it.

She tugs my shirt up and over my head, letting it drop onto the ground at our feet. I do the same ... my hormones forcing me to play along even though I'm getting a creepy Children of the Corn vibe. I forget all about that when I take her bra off, however. There's something almost surreal about seeing someone in all their glory with no bright lightning, just hints of light, splashes of shadow. The moon is hanging over us, casting some kind of spell that makes her skin look even milkier than it usually does. The stars are glistening like diamonds, the wind is blowing just enough to lift the ends of her hair, and when she steps out of her shorts ... I'm gone. She watches me intently, waiting for me to finish undressing and when our clothes are heaped on the ground ... she lets her head fall back and breathes deep.

I attack her neck at once.

She attacks my ass with the same intensity, raking her nails over it and making me hiss.

"Do you know how lucky we are?" I ask as my skin tingles, as chills race up and down my spine. "We don't have to hide ... us. From anyone."

"I'll never hide again."

I let my hands move over her waist and pull her against me, relishing the way her body feels when it's pressed against mine. Our breasts touch, our hips touch, our legs instinctively move together in a sensual way that never fails to take my breath away ... and I feel her heart pounding against mine. Or maybe I'm just imagining it. Either way, when we sink down ... we do it as one ... and I fleetingly think that she has found the softest earth possible ...

But I realize that I'm really feeling her ... and I'm sinking ... sinking ... sinking ... deeper than I've ever gone before.

It's a wide open space, but I'm lost in her.

"Hello?"

"Addison?"

"Hey! How's it going?"

I fumble around on the end table in search of the clock, but it's no use. My hands are still asleep. "Is something wrong?"

"No, not at all. I wanted to call and see how your vacation is going?"

"We're flying out today. I'm in mourning."

"I feel your pain. Do you have any idea how much fun I've had babysitting your cats? They're ugly little shits, but I want one. Mark likes the beige one. He sleeps on top of him."

"Mark sleeps on my cat?"

"No, idiot! The cat sleeps on him."

"Ohhh." I reach out to touch Erica, but the bed is empty. Shrill phone ringing. Check. Bladder full. Check. Being alone. Check. Not the best way to wake up by any stretch of the imagination. "So, how are things with you and Catman?"

"He ate my cooking and survived."

"Did he eat anything else?"

"Callie! You're dirty! And yes ... yes he did." I hear her laugh and have to smile in response. It's been so long since she's been this happy. "So, you guys are heading to Nebraska for a couple of days, right?"

"Yeah. We'll be home late on Friday. Thank GOD we have until Monday to recuperate."

"How has the ... er ... food been in Italy?"

"Is that a euphemism for sex?"

"Obviously," she replies. "You were ... starving ... for a while there."

"I've had the best sex of my entire life and I have no complaints," I assure her. "How are things at the hospital?"

"Well, Richard has pissed off several people."

"Really?"

"Stevens is back. Granted ... she's on probation and can't come out of the clinic, but she's back, Callie, and that's not right." Addison sighs on the other end of the line. "What happened with Duquette was bad enough, but all consuming love can fuck you up so I gave her a pass. What she did to YOU, though ... that's blind hatred."

The fact that Izzie Stevens has her job back makes me wish that I was only beginning my vacation again. Yes, I'd rather face the nervous breakdown of proposing to Erica all over again than have to deal with Stevens. Yes, I told Richard I was out of the equation and didn't want to give any input, but at the same time ... I don't want to have to listen to the drama surrounding her either. "Great," I reply. "Can't wait to get back."

"Don't worry. Mark has made her cry twice and I'm pretty sure that the bucket of puke that Yang dropped on her shoes was intentional."

"Let's not talk about her," I say, pushing the cover back and padding to the bathroom. The sun has come up and I smile when I gaze out at the sunflower field. I spent about three hours there ... and enjoyed every second of it. "Let's get back to you and Mark. Are you guys back together?"

"I think so. He told a drunken dickhead at Joe's that I was his woman and that he'd cut his tongue out is his said another thing to me. Which ... really ... felt like foreplay so we nearly got arrested for sex in the car."

"Nicely done, tramp."

"I thought so, too." Addison laughs. "I'm glad you're having a good time. Did you take plenty of pictures?"

"We did. Too many. We almost need another suitcase for film alone."

"Film is so passé. Go digital. Wha - what are - ARE YOU PEEING!?"

"No, I'm pissing, Addy."

"That is so RUDE. Who does that on the phone!?"

"I'm not pissing ON the phone and if I had waited another second ... I would have drowned."

"OH MY GOD! YOU EVEN FLUSHED!"

"Aren't you glad you called me? Now you can die happy. You know that my body is still functioning and you've heard Italian plumbing."

"You've been drinking too much Italian wine, dumbass." She's at the hospital. I can tell because I hear someone paging her over the intercom. "Shit. I think my patient just went into labor. Be careful in Nebraska and have a safe flight, okay?"

"You got it."

"I can't wait to see you again. I've missed you."

"I've missed you too, Addy. A lot."

"I gotta go. Love you."

"Love you back. Seeya soon."

My nose tells me that Erica is cooking so I locate my robe and slip it on. It hasn't gotten much use. I pad down the spiral staircase and pause at the bottom, watching Erica crack eggs into a bowl. She does it one handed and if I tried that ... I'd make a mess. I do great to crack with two hands and not get shell all over the place ... and by that I mean in the floor, in my hair, under my boob. She does it with ... God, I'm sick. It's so fucking mentally deranged that I can find something as simple and MUNDANE as eggs ... enthralling. I can actually have an internal dialogue with myself about Erica Hahn's culinary abilities and stand here like I've never seen anything like it. I'm going to make an appointment with the psychologist because this can't be normal. It just ... can't be. I've become that girl in the movies who bakes (read: burns) cookies and puts them in a wicker basket (with a checkerboard liner), then obsesses over everything while I walk fifteen miles to deliver them to the object of my affection. I hate me. I disgust myself with this ... adoration thing.

Love?

Makes us all assholes.

She smiles when she sees me and says, "This is our last morning here. I'm misty eyed just thinking about it."

"I know. I hate to leave." I move across the room and kiss her on the neck. "Wanna come back next year?"

"Depends. Are you going to do that thing in the sunflowers again?"

"Absolutely."

"Then it's a date." She winks at me. "Did I hear your phone?"

"Addison called. She finally snagged Mark."

Erica stops beating the eggs. "She better hope she didn't snag him in OUR bed."

I wrinkle my nose. "Ew."

My offer to help cook is politely declined and I'm sure that it's got everything to do with my lack of skill and not much to do with generosity on her part. I'm sure I'll be cleaning while she showers. Unless ... I join her. She's too quiet while she scrambles the eggs and I watch her while I sip my orange juice. There's a look on her face ... and I can't tell if it's because she's sad to go or if there's something else on her mind. She catches me watching and gives me the answer before I can ask. "Why don't we skip Nebraska, Cal? We can home instead. I don't know about you, but I miss our cats and really want to sleep our bed. You know, after we change the sheets. And possibly buy a new mattress."

"We're going, Yellow."

"There's really nothing to see there."

"I want to visit your parents."

Her lips tighten into a thin line as she hands me my breakfast. She sits down across from me, pushing her bacon around. "It's a long drive from the airport. And we're already going to be jet lagged so -"

"We'll sleep at the hotel."

Her eyes meet mine, defiant and determined. "I don't want to go."

"Why not?"

Her nostrils flare and I can see the tightening in her jaw ... a tightening that usually makes interns scatter. I'm not an intern, however. I don't break eye contact and I lift my chin, daring her to answer me. "Because," she finally says. "I'm ashamed of where I come from and I'm ashamed that you'll see it."

"Well, I'm ashamed of not seeing it. I want to know everything about you. It's my job."

"I'm not the same person who left that place."

"Then what's the problem?"

She picks up her fork and pushes her breakfast around. I can see she's weighing her words carefully, picking and choosing and carefully phrasing her fear. "I just ... hate it there."

"I'll be with you. We'll make it fun."

"It is physically impossible to have fun while visiting a graveyard."

"Wanna bet?"

"Tell me you've never ... CALLIOPE TORRES! That is sacred ground!"

"Yeah, and the dirt got into sacred places." I lick jelly off my finger, which really wasn't intended to be sexual, but she smiles knowingly. I pick up a napkin and use that instead (because I'm very FOCUSED), saying, "You started the worst fight we've ever had because you wanted to be alone on the anniversary of your parent's death. I haven't forgotten it."

Her smile is gone as rapidly as it appeared. "I apologized for that."

"The perfect apology is taking me with you when you finally say goodbye. You shut me out once. Don't do it again." I scowl at her. "Because if you don't let me tag along ... I'm going to stand you up at the altar."

"What makes you think I'll be the one waiting at the altar?"

"Because I don't intend to be."

A forkful of her eggs hit me in the face.

Stunned, I wipe my cheek and have to actually see the egg on my fingers to believe she went there. I don't bother with a fork ... I smear the other half of my toast over her forehead and leave it stuck in her hair.

Any final sightseeing we hoped to do is out of the question.

The only thing that takes more time than cleaning up the kitchen ... is erasing the evidence of our food fight from her ... with my tongue.

Angie comes out onto the sprawling front porch of the main house when our car crunches to a stop. She's so pretty, bathed in the midday sun, that I don't have to wonder what captivated Claudine. Dressed in a peach colored, modest dress, her brown eyes shine like beacons when she beckons for Erica and I to join her. We bought a gift for them the day before ... just a small token of gratitude for the story they shared and the hope they filled us with. The old woman hugs me close, then hugs Erica and accepts the gaily wrapped package Erica holds out. The silver candlesticks are well received and Angie lifts the scented candles inside, inhaling deeply. Claudine joins us, making a fuss over our gift like it's much more than it really is. I'd wager that Claudine cares more about who should could hit with a candlestick and whether or not she could polish her fingerprints off the silver. She's a tough one, Claudine.

"Come back soon," Angie tells us, clasping both of our hands in hers. "We see people come and go all the time, but I'll miss you."

I pat her on the arm. I'm semi-tempted to see if her hair feels like the cotton balls it resembles, but I really don't want her to slap me. "You have our number. Please stay in touch."

Erica hugs her again and I realize that this ... this is really the closest thing to a grandmother either of us have. Angie smiles at me over Erica's shoulder and then Claudine says, "Aw, to hell with it! Give me a damn hug, too."

I do just that, laughing. Did I mention that Claudine is like Cristina? She's an observer. She stands off to the side of life and watches, but doesn't touch much, doesn't leave fingerprints on many people. She's left them on me, though. And I may never wash them off.

Erica and I stay until the last possible minute ... and she pauses in the driveway so that we can wave from our matchbox car when we finally drive away. The lump in my throat will burn for hours ... long after we're over the ocean and halfway home.

There's a sisterhood that exists with women like us. Angie and Claudine are pioneers who speak about their love in intimate settings, keeping it black and white. Erica and I are new to the land ... at least I am, but we live in color, not hiding at all. There's an instant respect for where they've been and they're in awe of where we're going. I look at them and see every laugh line that love etched on their faces. I look at them and feel envious of how much they shared in their life.

They look at me and see how much I still have in front of me.

Yes, there is a sisterhood and I'm in it.

I'm in it with no regrets, no qualms, and no desire to turn back.

It's funny that I used to long for a man in my life so much that I saw love with George where it really didn't exist. I was so starved that I wouldn't admit that I was never as important to him as he was to me.

And now ... I'm so loved, so appreciated, so damn ... cherished ... that the only thing I long for is one more day, one more hour, one more lifetime.

I've worked through my issues and arrived at a place where I could not ask for more in my love life.

Now it's time for Erica to walk through her own personal wasteland and unlock the pain of her past once and for all.

I'll be there. Every step of the way ... I've got her.

But if her silence on the flight and groan of misery when we don't miss the connection to Nebraska (even though she dawdles so much that we barely make it) is any indication ... my work is cut out for me.

That's okay.

I've worked hard to get here. So I'm strong enough to work even harder to pull her there.

Obstacles dot every horizon all the time, but they aren't nearly as scary when you have someone beside to help out. Whether we have to go under, over, around or THROUGH it ... we'll be just fine.

The most normal relationship I've ever had is with her.

Isn't it ironic?


	26. Chapter 26

As lush and green as Italy was, Nebraska is the exact opposite. I don't know if it's lack of rain or general disinterest, but there are barren, brown fields and plenty of thriving weeds as we drive toward the small town that Erica called home. Mobile homes seem to be popular. I see plenty of single wide dwellings and not a lot of doublewides. What I also don't see a lot of ... is people. Erica wasn't kidding about how rural the area is. In Miami the population makes it hard to go about your business, but here we can drive for miles and see nothing. I get the sinking suspicion that we're getting close when she turns off the main road and begins to execute a maze of streets that are almost as narrow as the ones in Tuscany.

Pointing to her left, she says, "That was my high school."

I lean forward to get a better look at the dilapidated building. It's so small it could be a doctor's office. One side of the roof has collected enough debris from the towering trees that it has caved in. I can't imagine, even before it became so run down, that it was a very happy place to be. Sometimes, a place will give up its laughter one last time so that you can hear it in your mind. I don't hear anything as she eases past. This town ... it seems to be as silent as she has been since we left the airport.

To lighten the mood, I say, "How many kids were in your graduating class?"

She smiles, glancing at me. "Nineteen, which made it pretty easy to graduate top of the class with every honor available. I just failed to mention the numbers on college applications."

"Wow," I reply, looking across the street at the middle school. The building that is supposed to be the gym is hidden behind ivy and vines, but what strikes me the most is the absence of a playground or track of any kind. "What happened to the town? There's nothing here."

"It's like a lot of small farm towns. There's more space than people and our generation had no interest in farming. Most of us got out and big corporations started buying off the land after a while. Apartment buildings went up on the good side of the tracks and the people on this side moved there or moved on." She turns beside the middle school and then again on a tree lined road with mill houses that are all built in the same manner and are all boarded up. She eases to a stop in front of one that might have been yellow, but has turned a dirty shade of lime. "This is where my biological mother grew up. My grandmother died in the bedroom after suffering a stroke." She points to the side yard, where a rusted tractor sits with broken down pride. "And two years later, my grandfather passed away after he worked in his yard all day. Heart attack."

I look away from the tractor and watch her. She's gazing out at the house like she's remembering something, but whatever it is doesn't bring a smile to her face. If anything, it gives her a hollow, almost bitter look. "How old were you then?"

"I was eight when he died. I walked home from the school and found him sitting there on the plow with his head down. I thought he was praying for rain. Everybody was always praying for rain." She meets my eyes and gives me a smile that doesn't quite look genuine. "So, I moved to the rainiest place in the States. Rain is the last thing I want to pray for."

"Erica-"

"You want to see if we can get in?"

I look back at the house. The tiny porch is filthy, the stone steps are crumbling, and the iron stair rail is actually in the yard with a tangle of weeds holding it down, but I feel myself nod. I asked for this. I asked to see all the secrets that she kept for herself. I asked to see her laid bare and this is the heaviest layer we'll have to lift. I climb out of the car and take a deep breath. The smell of rotting vegetables is cloying and I look around for the source, but see none. She walks ahead of me, her sneakers automatically moving over the leaf covered sidewalk while I take tentative steps behind her. Several smaller rocks crumble off the steps when she climbs to the top and she turns, extending her hand to help me.

When we're on the porch, I can feel the wood sagging under my feet and stand completely still while she tugs a horizontal piece of wood off the front door. She rests it against the side of the house and tries the knob, which is locked. Undaunted, she reaches over the window and pulls down a dirt covered key, which she unlocks the door with. It creaks open and I watch dust stir on the faded, ripped linoleum as she steps inside. I move in behind her, feeling like a trespasser ... like I'm walking on bones.

There's no electricity so she doesn't bother with any switches. Two things go through my mind at once, though. I'm glad that I don't have to see the place any better than I do and there's an obvious rat problem. There are droppings everywhere and it smells like several may have died. In order to focus on something else, I watch Erica move to the fireplace and look at the photographs on the mantle.

"My grandparents," she says, "left everything to my uncle. He was greedy ... not that there was much to share or anything. I was already gone by the time he finally agreed to let my parents park their trailer out back."

My eyes widen. "Is this - did they die out there?"

She nods, still eyeing the mantle. I join her and gasp when I see a photo of a little blond haired girl with crystal blue eyes. "Is this you?!"

"Yeah." She points at another photo, where she's sitting on an old man's knee. They both look solemn, almost like they didn't know how to smile. Or simply had no reason. "That was my grandfather. He never forgave me for not being a boy."

Her long finger points to another photo, this one waterlogged behind the frame. "That's my biological mother and my aunt ... the one who adopted me."

I could have picked out Erica's mother in a lineup. They have the same curly, unruly hair and smile. I lean forward for a better look and notice that Erica's aunt doesn't look very pleased. Her arms are crossed and her gaunt face is lined and sharply angled. The difference between the two sisters is night and day. But there's nothing I can say because I don't want to hurt Erica's feelings or overstep any of the invisible boundaries I've been feeling since the plane landed. So, I move down the mantle with her, listening to her tell me about this aunt or that cousin and when we reach the end, I finally say, "Why don't you take a few pictures?"

She looks at me like I've grown two heads. "Why would I do that?"

"They're yours. And I'd like our kids to see your family."

The stagnant, haunted look flees her face and she gives me the first genuine smile of the day. "I didn't think of that."

"Well, I am a notorious thinker." I hook my finger in the belt loop of her pants and pull her forward. When I give her a kiss, she holds onto me a little longer than usual, then takes my hand as she leads me into the kitchen.

There are only two cabinets and one of those is barely hanging on the wall. The stove is a strange green color, narrower than anything I've ever seen and the refrigerator is so small that I feel ten feet tall as I tower over it. The round table is tiny and the two chairs are mismatched. There's no dishwasher, no microwave. I feel like I'm touring through a museum of poverty that most people would walk out of and immediately deny that it could possibly be this bad. It is this bad. The living room furniture was horrible, but this ... is hard to look at. The sink is held up with two by fours and the only work surface is a rough looking laminated table beside the stove. Someone tacked curtains to the side of it to hide the contents underneath, but they're open now. I can see a popcorn tin and a big container of flour.

People lived here.

People cooked here.

There's no pantry that I can see, though, so I'm left wondering how often the table creaked under a good dinner. To the left is a bedroom that has a mattress and box springs on the floor. That's all. No dresser. No mirror. No pictures or anything that could make it a home. Directly through the bedroom is a bathroom with a tub, but no shower. Once again, the bathroom sink has been crudely held up with pieces of wood that look like they would crumble under the weight of a sink full of water. The toilet is cracked, the seat gone.

Erica notices that I'm looking at it and says, "It never had a seat. At least as long as I can remember."

She doesn't give me a chance to reply. We move back through the bedroom, toward the front of the house again. There's another bedroom there and this one has a full sized bed with no cover. The mattress is full of stains and is easily the most colorful thing I've seen, despite the fading and filth. There is a dresser in this room and Erica sits down on a rickety looking bench, staring at the perfume bottles and jewelry box there. I'm sure that anything of value has long since been picked over, but she still opens it and listens to the first few strands of music that plays.

Her eyes drift shut and I watch her, trying to imagine the pretty little girl in the photograph doing the same thing. I'm sure that she lost herself in something so simple as the tinkering of a music box the same way Jasper loses himself in the dolphins on his ceiling. Or ... the way he did before Buddha gave him comfort and he no longer needed them.

I hope that I give Erica that same kind of freedom and when I put my hand on her shoulder and her eyes meet mine in the cracked mirror ... I know that I do. Kneeling down beside her, I say, "I know this hard on you."

"I always said I'd never come back."

"Not coming back has hurt you," I tell her. "You have to make peace with this place ... and with what happened to your parents before you can ask them to stop haunting you every year. Because that fight we had ... when I stayed at Mark's place ... that wasn't about us. It was about them and the fact that you never said goodbye."

She closes the music box and turns, looking down at me. "A therapist once told me I should come back and speak my piece, but I have no clue what to say."

"I can't help you with that."

I rest my hand on her knee so that she can feel me, but really ... so that I can feel her. The Erica Hahn that I've gotten to know and love is perfectly comfortable in first class. She's perfectly fine in five star restaurants and doesn't bat an eyelash when it comes to expensive security cameras on her property. I can't imagine that the same Erica who grew up with so little could fit seamlessly into a world of so much. She makes it look easy. I'm ashamed that I have so much trouble when I was groomed for the best of everything. She teaches me something new everyday.

"There's only one more thing to see," she says, focusing on the back wall of the room. "Their trailer."

I nod at her and take her hand. She squeezes it tight and I'm shocked at how clammy and moist her palm is. She's not sweating ... I'm not even sweating, but her nerves are evident. I begin to rethink stinking to my guns about coming here when she opens the back door and the sound she makes in the back of her throat is like nothing I've ever heard before. She draws up short and I walk into her like a total idiot ... then I see the burned up wreckage in the distance. She wasn't lying about it being little more than a pull behind camper and one whole end is open, burned wide.

That's where her parents slept and died.

And Erica slept somewhere inside it, too, growing up. Off and on and in between apartments that were barely afforded and eviction notices that pulled the fragments of home from her, paper cutting her address and leaving her with none, this small, metal can ... was Erica's shelter. When I think of our house now ... I get it. I get why she busts her ass and spends hours making the yard so beautiful that you don't need the television as a distraction. You can be entertained just gazing at the colors and watching what she planted come to life. She makes our place so god damn pretty ... because she grew up with god damn ugly.

And she hasn't been back.

She hasn't seen the damage.

Maybe what's she's seeing right now ... is how pretty life COULD have been if someone had thought to take care of her. It's not even my place to do it, but I start to cry. Even before she does. Hot tears course down my cheeks as I try to imagine what a little girl would play with here. There are no tire swings, no doll houses or rusted bicycles to prove that she was ever here at all. I don't see toys, there's no place she could have hidden away to let her imagination take her anywhere else, and the truth of how desperate is must have been falls over me like a million chains. I feel the way she must have felt.

And I want nothing more than to leave with her and make sure she never has to look back.

She looks at me when she hears me sniffle and puts her arm around me. She's not crying and I don't know how that can possibly be. So I ask her.

"I can't," she replies softly. "If I start now ... I may never stop."

"Baby ..."

"I'm okay." She takes a step forward, ready to go take a look at the trailer, but I stop her. "What?"

"I'm proud of you," I tell her and my words are the choking kind that come out on a semi sob. "You're strong, but you don't have to be. I mean, your family died here. All of them. Your grandparents, your parents ... it's okay to hurt. It's okay to be mad that this house and that trailer was as good as it got for you. Erica ... it's okay to not be okay."

She turns to face me. "If I was here alone ... I'd fall apart ... but I don't need to do that when you're around. Come on now."

I let her lead me across the yard and even though it has been years since the trailer burned ... I can still smell it. One time ... I burned the hair off my arms when I added too much lighter fluid to the grill and that's what it smells like now. Like hair and skin and dreams that died in an inferno.

I don't follow when Erica makes a circle around the trailer. I don't need to peer into the window or see the inside. Apparently she does, however, and I object when she opens the door and the entire structure creaks and groans, a metallic grinding that sets my teeth on edge. "It's not safe," I tell her.

She disappears inside anyway and I follow because if the roof collapses ... or if she collapses ... I want to be with her. As much as it pains me to admit this ... I've never been in a mobile home. Unless you count the RV that my dad bought on a whim and then sold after four hundred miles into a cross country endeavor. We flew home after his nerves and my mother's running list of how ridiculous it was finally took its toll. I can remember being so claustrophobic that I was miserable and that feeling comes back when I see the tiny kitchen and windows that are like those in a school bus. Erica moves down the hall, away from the charred end and I blindly follow, hoping with all my heart that our combined weight doesn't do more than make the trailer moan in protest. Which it does beautifully.

I get sidetracked by photos in the hallway and when I finally enter a narrow doorway, I find Erica sitting on a small bed that has been pushed against the wall. There's no headboard and the comforter has been eaten up by moths. Looking at her makes me miserable so I look at the walls instead. She has hung every award, every recognition ... from the Science Club to the Math Club to Chorus (which never should have happened because she can't sing) ... on every conceivable space. There are certifications from Home Economics, Literature, and P.E. as well as blue ribbons that could be for anything. It's obvious to me that for Erica ... they were everything.

What the room doesn't have ... is pieces of her. There's no hairbrush, no favorite teddy bear that you hang onto when you transition from little girl to young woman. There are no posters of celebrities or photographs of friends.

Whatever made Erica awkward and anti-social happened in this room, in this place, in this life that she clawed through school to leave behind.

I will never, ever think that my life was horrible again. Compared to this ... it was a fairy tale.

"I used to close the door so I wouldn't have to hear them yelling." Her voice echoes a little in the room, reminding me that it's hollow here. "The walls are paper thin though and I'd hear all about what a burden I was, how they never should have taken me, how I didn't pull my own weight.

"What that meant," Her eyes find mine. "Is that I wasn't willing to steal something for them to pawn so that they could buy more liquor. I wasn't willing to drop out of school and work full time so that they could stay here and party on my dime. I wasn't willing to let their supplier come in here and ... do the things to me that he did to my mother ... so I was the burden in the back room who they couldn't wait to get rid of and I couldn't wait to go. The day I left for college ... I sat down in this spot and I listened to them celebrating that they were rid of me ... and I promised myself that I would never be here again. No matter what ... I'd forget that this room and those people existed."

"We should go." I hold out my hand, but she doesn't take it. "There's nothing -"

"You wanted to see it, Callie. Here it is. This? This is why I don't make friends because when they inevitably ask about where I'm from ... I can't tell them. I have to lie and you don't lie to friends so I don't bother. This? This is why I fought so fucking hard to have a life with Rachel that was so suburban, so mundane and ordinary and this is why I begged you to move in with me." She stops talking for a second. "This silence? It creeps into you and the loneliness that you feel, that disparity that I can see on your face ... it looks back at you in the mirror when you live like this. I don't get close to people because people never got close to me ... even my own people."

"You're close to me. You're close to Jasper and my Dad and Addison loves you." I shrug my shoulders. "You aren't sitting in this spot alone this time, you know? You invited me in and I'm here to stay. And you don't have to lie to anyone about where you're from. You should be proud to tell anyone that you grew up in Godforsaken, Nebraska, population 0, and worked your ass off to get the hell out of dodge."

"But-"

"You're the only person left. It's up to you to decide whether these skeletons stay in the closet ... or you bury them once and for all. And I'm all for nothing being in the closet except our clothes."

"You are the most ... AHHHHH!"

"WHAT!?"

"AHHHHHH!"

She points at the doorway, where a snake has spread itself across the threshold like a barrier. She leaps onto the bed, still screaming, then yanks me forward trying to pull me with her. I let her and we stand hunched over so that our heads don't hit the ceiling. The situation is not a good one. The brownish gray snake has diamond markings and I don't need to see the head to know that it will be triangular. I also don't need to see the tail to know that there will be rattles and judging by the snake's girth ... quite a few rattles. It's a fully grown, fully mature, and apparently pregnant female.

And the school bus like window in the room was not built for a woman with hips like mine to fit through.

Erica is cutting off the circulation in my arm and I shake her off, looking around the room. The last thing I want to do is poke a rattler because let's face it ... common sense is our friend ... but I can't very well let the thing nap in the doorway either. Once we vibrate the floor by walking around ... the snake is going to slither away in fear ... or hang around to investigate potential food and I'm sure that our ankles will look pretty appetizing. My eyes land on the curtain rod hanging over the window and I reach for it.

"What are you doing?" Erica demands, grabbing my arm again.

"I'm going to move it out of the way so we can leave."

"No! You're not!"

"Would you prefer to spend the night here?"

Her eyes move to the curtain rod. "I'll do it."

I roll my eyes at her and remove the rod, making quick work of the spider infested curtains. I let the material fall to the floor and check the strength of my 'weapon'. She reaches for it, but I move it out of her range. "How many snakes have you messed with?" I ask.

"Well ... none."

"Okay, do you remember that snakes were my childhood thing?"

"And?"

"I know what I'm doing." I assure her, giving her a confident smile. I actually feel less than confident because the only rattle snake I ever got close to was behind glass, but that's not really the point. Erica will freak out the second the rattler moves and I won't.

I hope.

Oh, how I hope.

I take a deep breath, ready to save the day. I inch toward the edge of the bed and -

"WAIT!"

"God dammit!" I nearly fall face first into the floor. Lucky for me, she reaches out and steadies me before I topple. "Do not DO that, Erica."

"Do what?"

"Would you like it if someone yelled at you during surgery?"

"Callie, this is not a surgery! And I'd be less inclined to yell if you had a scalpel. Or a gun. Maybe an Uzi."

"It's fine! Just ... stay on the bed."

"If you get bit by that thing ... so help me GOD ... the ass kicking I give you will be harder for the hospital to treat!"

"Yeah, okay. I'll keep that in mind."

She's clutching my arm in both hands now and tightens her grip when I try to pull away. "Let's wait it out."

"What are we waiting FOR?" I demand. "The sun to set so we can't see it?"

"It's an anaconda!" she cries. "How can we NOT see it?"

"It's a rattle snake and they don't glow in the dark."

"A rattle snake!? Oh my god. Don't move!"

"I'm not moving. I CAN'T move unless you let go of me."

She doesn't. She looks back at the door, where the fat snake is lying there like it KNOWS that it's tormenting us without really trying. I'm sure our shtick is making the damn serpent's day. "I can throw my shoe at it," she finally states, matter of factly.

"Good thinking. Because your heavy duty, fang retardant cotton sock will protect your foot better than rubber and leather."

"I don't really think sarcasm is helping."

"Neither is talking!" I hold up the curtain rod. "I'm going to move it out of the way."

"And after it swallows your arm ... you're going to die because I will be unconscious on the floor and unable to call 911."

"I'm not getting bit!"

"UNTIL YOU SAY THINGS LIKE THAT!"

"You are clawing my arm off! Quit it!" I finally shake her loose and point at the half moon marks that she left with her nails. "Look! I'm maimed!"

"Not yet, but you will be if you keep on." She narrows her eyes at me to prove that she means it.

I step off the bed to prove that I do, too. "Be quiet."

"Oh my god."

"Be quieter than that."

"Callie-"

"Do not say another word."

Bending down, I pull my socks up as far as they will go and tug my jeans down over my sneakers, keeping my eyes dead ahead. I move like a shadow, barely making a sound. It's enough. I see the diamond patterns ripple and hear the shake of rattles. It feels like the whisper of a ghost against my flesh as I hold the rod like a sword and take a few baby steps. Just as I feared it would, at the first gentle prodding the snake's rattler goes haywire and it slithers out of sight. I peer around the corner and see that it has coiled itself up, ready to bite anything that moves. I watch it's forked tongue dart in and out and it strikes the air when it sees me.

Of all the things I could be thinking ... what I do think about ... is the Crocodile Hunter. No, I'm not thinking the snake is a 'beauty' or a 'ripper' or 'cute'. I'm thinking 'danger, danger, danger' in a thick Aussie accent. Not taking my eyes off the venomous beauty, I say, "Erica, is there anything in this place that you want?"

"Why? Should we burn this side down?"

"No." The snake strikes again, coming far too close to the opening of the door for my liking. "Because when you hand me your comforter and I throw it over the snake ... you better be carrying anything you want when you run like hell."

"There's nothing I want here."

The bedclothes rustle behind me and I hear her step into the floor. I take a handful of the cover. "On three."

"Oh shit. Fuck. Shit. SHIT! Callie, the nearest hospital is-"

"One."

"- about an hour away and-"

"Two."

"- if we survive this ... I'm going to -"

"Three!"

I throw the curtain rod, making the snake strike furiously. Then I throw the comforter and my aim is true. It lands on the snake and the hissing is louder than the rattling when I yell, "RUN!"

"- beat the shit out of you! THE ABSOLUTE SHIT! RUN FASTER! FOR GOD'S SAKE! DON'T LOOK BACK!!"

We somehow make it down the hallway nearly shoulder to shoulder and leap from the doorway. We don't stop running at all until we skid to a halt on her grandparent's back porch and the only reason we stop then is because barreling through the screen door could be painful. Out of breath, she rushes through the kitchen and begins gathering the photos off the mantle. I help her, stacking a few like books in my arms. She makes one last stop, grabbing the music box from the dresser in the front bedroom ... and the we run out like thieves in the night.

Which ... I guess in some ways ... we are.

Except that it's dusk.

Even though the rental car is a nondescript sedan ... it looks ritzy after what I've seen and we practically throw our bounty into the trunk before racing to climb into our seats. When the engine is running and the air is blasting in our face ... we finally look at each other.

She starts laughing first. "Snattle rake!"

"Bite me."

We keep laughing until something smacks against the top of the car.

We become as silent and still as statues.

Then she yanks the car into gear and guns it. I turn in time to see a pine cone roll off the roof and onto the trunk, but it's not funny anymore.

My plan for spending the night in Nebraska failed to include hotel reservations and we have to drive fifty miles before we see a place. It's only slightly better than the Seattle Skyline Inn, but I'm so grateful to have a place to stretch out after our adventure that I don't care. I flop onto the bed, arms flung over my head, and breathe deep. Erica hasn't joined me after ten minutes and I sit up, watching her flip through the ancient album she rescued from the snake den. She seems to be lost in thought so I don't say anything for a while.

I leave her to revisit her past while I attempt to figure out where we are and what we can have delivered for dinner. Snake charming has made me excessively hungry and even though our room smells like glue ... my appetite is as strong as ever. I finally resort to the phone book instead of my Blackberry and find a pizza place that agrees to bring it to us. My mother calls the second I hang up with Paul's Pizzeria. I've spoken to her once since I was in Italy and that's only because she wanted to know what size pants Erica wears. She's sending her a birthday package that I hope doesn't include a male fireman calendar.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Calliope! Are you back on this continent?"

"We're in Nebraska."

"Lovely."

"Not really."

"Is everything okay?" she asks, concern evident.

"Yeah." I glance at Erica. She has shut the photo album and is gazing at the curtain covered windows with a pensive look on her face. I keep waiting for her to fall ... so that I can catch her. "I think we're going to live in Italy when we retire. It was so beautiful, Mom."

"How are you and Erica?"

Most mothers inquire about their child's relationship without the hope for destruction. Not mine. She makes it sound like she's hoping for me to tell her that I abandoned my girlfriend at the airport and left with the pilot. The MALE pilot. "Never better. Did I mention that Italy is the most romantic place ever?"

Mom doesn't make a sound. Then she sighs, just barely. "Derek was approved for the clinical trial. Jasper's pre-op screening is in two weeks. We want to do this thing as soon as possible ... so that he can recover in time for Christmas."

Wow.

I think maybe I didn't expect that my fight for the surgery would feel so ... much like I lost. Jasper's day of reckoning is coming and it could go either way. I could have pushed this hard for him to be healed or ... I could be strapping him into the electric chair ... and asking my co-worker to flip the switch. My heart feels like it may have forgotten how to beat and I rub a hand over the back of my neck, shocked at how much I'm sweating. Everything is real now.

"Callie?" Mom asks.

"What? I'm here."

Maybe there's something in my voice that indicates how tenuous my grasp on control is because Erica turns and looks at me at the same time my mother launches into a sermon about everything being in God's hands. I barely listen because I can't hear her over the thunder of my own thoughts. I'm vaguely aware that Erica has joined me and that she's rubbing my back, but the comfort it should give me doesn't come.

I ask to speak to Jazz, but he's already sleeping. He spent all day at the carnival with Joel, riding the Ferris wheel ten million times. Mom tells me that he came home with cotton candy in his hair (which she has let him grow out) and a stuffed animal so big that Buddha pounced on it and ripped the stuffing out.

Erica didn't have carnivals in her childhood.

And I'm taking the childhood out of Jasper's carnival.

I don't know which is worse.

We talk for a few more minutes, then my dad is on the line and I try to sound upbeat because he keeps joking with me. I avoid mentioning Jasper and happily hand over the phone when he asks to speak to Erica. I don't hang around to listen to her side of the conversation. I go into the tiny, dingy bathroom and splash my face with cold water. Even though the mirror is clean ... I look distorted and ... dirty ... in it.

Did I do the right thing?

Mom said that Jasper is in God's hand ... but I wonder if God actually has his hand's full with orchestrating my fear.

Is this apprehension really God's way of telling me to stop the surgery?

I hear the doorknob wiggle behind me and shut the water off, drying my face. I still feel too hot, too flushed and dried out. I put the towel on the sink and open the door, pasting a smile on my face. This is Erica's time ... she needs to work on her own family issues instead of mine. "The pizza should be here soon," I tell her, kissing her cheek.

She lets me walk past her without a word, but she doesn't miss a beat. "Are you okay?"

"Mmm hmmm." I pick up the remote and turn on the television. It's not the flat panel that I'm used to, but it still has sound and I need background noise. I need something with a laugh track to remind me that I still can. I stretch out on my stomach and mindlessly flip through channel after channel.

Erica takes the remote from my hand and turns it off just as I find 'I Love Lucy'. She sets it on top of the television and squats down at the foot of the bed, not far from my head. "Santos said that they're flying in for Jasper's pre-op."

I nod at her.

She rests her chin on her hands the same way I am. "And you're not happy about that."

I shake my head.

She tilts hers just a little. "I know that I was against this surgery, but I really believe that he will be okay."

"And if he's not?"

She traces one finger over my cheek. "Then you'll know you tried."

"And that I killed him."

"He won't die."

"He could."

"We all COULD. In an instant. But he's not leaving you."

"You don't know that."

"I know that he loves you as much as I do. And if I didn't leave you today ... after having the shit scared out of me while I suffered a massive coronary over that snake ... then he's not going to either."

I have to grin at her. "I should get a job as a snake handler."

"Yeah. Because I need to go to prison for kidnapping, false imprisonment, and bombing your place of employment."

"You're scary."

"You're the one with a snake fetish."

We pass the remainder of our one night in Nebraska watching 'Thelma and Louise', gorging ourselves on pizza, and taking turns keeping an eye out for anything in the rodent family.

You know what real love is?

Forgetting your own problems to help your partner through their own.

Erica does it for me.

I do it right back for her.

Happily.

Whoever names graveyards has to have a sense or humor. Or maybe a sense of irony. Rolling Hills in Seattle doesn't have a hill at all. Shady Acres in Miami doesn't have a tree on the premises. And Travesty Memorial Gardens in Nebraska doesn't grow anything like a garden should ... even weeds. It is a travesty though so I think it's the best name for a place where the reminder of how unfair death is rises up from the ground in monuments of concrete squares and angels. Whoever maintains the property has cut the grass so close to the ground that it withered just like the bodies that it blankets and I listen to it crunch under my feet as Erica pulls a piece of paper from her purse. She pauses beside a large pillar that has been erected to honor the Smythwick family and I take a second to really look at her. She didn't bother with any makeup and that's fine with me, but the circles under her eyes look like she's bleeding the indigo of the ocean. She looks bruised ... like she went a few rounds with something stronger than her all night.

As much as she tossed, turned, and thrashed ... she should have been declared the winner.

"I think it's this way," she says, pointing to the left.

I'm carrying two oversized wreathes while she carries a third. The flowers are as fake as the illusion of calm I'm trying to pull off, but we decided on the silk because they would last longer than real ones. The winding path through the headstones is not paved, but a few white pebbles have been thrown down ... enough to keep grass from daring to shoot through. If I really tried ... maybe I could convince myself we are on a yellow brick road and not mired in no man's land.

I trail after her mutely. There really isn't much you can say when you're following someone towards inevitable pain. As much as I'd like to bear the brunt of it for her, I can't. My hands are tied. This is the last place either of us want to be, but it's someplace she needs to be. I see that some of her spirit is broken a little at a time when she dredges up the remnants of her past and the only way she can heal is to see for herself that it is really, truly over. Her parents can't hurt her anymore. They're long gone and all she has to do is bury her pain and those shattered memories with them. They can't rise to greet her ... and she can't sink to confront them.

It ends now. Today.

She will walk away.

They will stay behind and hopefully never trespass on our lives again.

I haven't experienced much death. All of my grandparents passed away, but I was only ever close to my dad's parents. They died two years apart and I didn't cry for them, I cried because my father became a little boy both times, sobbing for a mother, then a father, who would never comfort him again. Really ... death doesn't hurt the people who go ... it hurts the ones who are left behind to question if they were good enough. My father did a lot of soul searching when he lost his parents and I think he finally saw that his children were a reflection of them ... he had taught us the lessons that they taught him ... and through the looking glass of our eyes he could see his own success as a son, a father, a man.

The only life lesson Erica took from her parents ... is what NOT to do. But she has still come bearing gifts, offering them a token of remembrance when she'd really rather forget.

I guess they did teach her generosity, which she freely gives, because they withheld it from her so greedily.

Because watching her sends a shard of glass through my heart, I look anywhere but at her. Instead, I marvel at the headstones around us. What the people in this poor, desolate place lacked in life is more than made up for in death. Intricately carved testimonies to love dot the landscape and I realize that grief can make a person dig a little deeper into their bank accounts. It's almost vulgar ... such extravagant and obscene gestures. My eyes are inexplicably drawn to a kneeling angel, whose concrete hair has spilled over a bassinet, shielding her precious cargo from view. The baby that earned such an outpouring was four days old when he died ... but his mother probably felt like he had been with her for life when he took his last breath. My father's grief over his own almost sent him toppling into Grandpa's grave as they lowered his casket. Dad didn't follow, but if it had been any of us kids ... I don't doubt for a second that he would have laid down on our coffin and waited for the dirt to come in after him.

Cemeteries whisper their tales of woe to you. Those stories are indelibly stamped, chiseled, etched, and carved onto slabs of rock. You know that there are 'beloved mothers', 'devoted husbands', 'doting fathers' and if you listen carefully ... you can hear the quiet sobs that came before you, like epitaphs aren't the only things clinging to the stones. I hear a wrenching cry, a garbled word caught up on the gentle breeze, and I look around for the source, but the source is standing just a few feet away from me.

The wreath that Erica had carried is now at her feet and one hand is against her lips.

This?

This is watching the tallest, strongest, mightiest oak tree in the forest crack down the middle and split into.

And I don't know what to say.

I don't know what to DO.

I brought her here to stare down the devil, but now that the time has come ... I can't fight him off for her.

"It's not right! It's not RIGHT!" she garbles the words, strangled on her own emotion.

"I know." That's what I say, but it's a brazen lie. I don't know. Seeing where she lived, walking through her memories, breathing the stinking air she breathed ... I still don't KNOW what she went through. "Death is never ri-"

"It was supposed to be bigger!"

I follow her gaze and comprehension dawns. She's looking at a black granite headstone and I can see two names, one on top of the other. She's right ... it's not big enough for two people. It's the size of one life, not nearly enough to encompass two. It's not the side by side, fancy man and wife tribute that it should have been. It's one solitary, lonely, smashed together display of ... nothing.

I say, "We'll fix it. We can get a new one and-"

"YOU CAN'T FIX IT!" she yells. "IT CAN NEVER BE FIXED! IT'S BROKEN!"

She stalks forward, kicking the headstone and I realize that there was a fissure that deepens and cracks under the pressure. One corner falls away and when it hits the ground ... so does she. She falls to her knees and I swear to GOD I feel it under my feet, a rippling like something so heavy and BIG has tumbled to the ground that it shakes my foundation. Her hands go over her face, part of her hair falls out of the elastic band, and she sobs in a way that doctors hear frequently, but never grow immune to.

I don't drop my flowers. I carry them with me and spread them out like they're priceless before I join her, feeling the hard, unyielding earth biting into my knees as I hug her. She clutches at my forearm, digging her fingers in and I kiss her temple, holding on. I'm caught up in her tornado of pain and even though the wind isn't cutting us ... the debris is hitting us hard. The pieces of a broken childhood can feel like a bullet when it finally whistles through the Kevlar vest you wear to protect your insides.

Erica's insides are now OUTSIDE and I can see every scar she was left with.

Her words come out in a nonsensical way, mostly a murmur that I can only pick fragments out of. I listen in earnest though and finally hear one question. It's only one, but she repeats it clearly.

"Why didn't they love me?"

How do you answer that? Is she talking to me? Is she talking to God? I don't know.

"I was a good kid. I never got in the way. I never asked for anything. I just ... I wanted them to hang onto me like you are, Callie, but they ... they wouldn't even touch me. Why? Why didn't they LOVE me?"

"You can't love somebody if you don't love yourself. And they didn't. They loved their alcohol and their drugs, but not themselves." I tighten my grip. "That's THEIR fault, not yours."

"I was a good kid. I was not a burden."

"Burdens are just reminders. And you reminded them that they were accountable. You reminded them that the world didn't revolve around them and THEIR needs." I rest my head against hers, praying for the right words. "Some people just can't be what you want them to be so instead of punishing themselves for it ... they punish you. You didn't burden them ... you reminded them that life is for the living and they were killing themselves."

She's not crying quite so hard now and her grip isn't so constraining. She accepts the tissue that is wedged in the pocket of my jeans (which I brought for myself, but don't need) and blows her nose. When her eyes meet mine, they're red and bloodshot. "How do you do that, Cal?"

"Do what?"

"Talk to my soul."

"Because mine won't shut up." I rub the wetness on her cheek, then kiss the tip of her nose. "You were a good kid who grew into an amazing woman. Your parents may have given you that hard outer shell you carry around, but they also gave you a broken heart enough times to know better than to pay it forward. You take care of people because you were never taken care of and you do a damn good job of it, Yellow."

She gives me a half smile and then a kiss. Her gaze moves back to the headstone and she picks up her purse, rummaging through it. I expect her to bring out more tissue but she doesn't. She pulls out her wallet and rifles through the back pocket until she finds a piece of paper. It's brittle, worn and in danger of falling apart when she opens it and hands it to me. It's an ad for headstones and she has circled one that is nothing like the one that we are kneeling in front of. "It was supposed to look like that," she tells me. "I found this picture right before I graduated medical school and spent my first check as an intern on it. I should have come back ... I should have made sure it was right."

Whatever motivates a neglected child to give so much is the same thing that makes an abused child protect their parents. I don't understand that particular trait unless it's because a child's love is so genuine and unwavering ... even when it's undeserved. I hold the paper back out to her and say, "It's beautiful."

"I can get a new one." She makes the statement as if to say that she has accomplished enough in life to easily afford a better monument ... not to convince herself that she should. I watch her lift her hand and trace her father's name, then her mother's. "But maybe they would have liked this ... being together, so close. Maybe it's better."

I reach around her and pick up the corner that broke off the stone when she kicked it. It's heavy and I have to steady it with both hands as I ease it back into place. I brush the dust off and nod at my handiwork. "Now it's better."

She watches me until I squirm. "Yeah. It is."

We put one spray of flowers over the marker and recline the other against it. She hovers for a while, her hands in her pockets, and I move away to give her the space she needs for goodbye. I don't give her a wide enough berth to feel alone, however, and when she finally nods ... I know that this chapter of her life has been written ... the final words are in place ... and she's ready to turn the page of the next adventure.

She picks up the third wreath and we walk four rows over. She doesn't need a map to find her biological mother. People rarely do ... family has a way of coming back to you. The headstone for Mary Elizabeth Anderson is white with pink flecks and the roses carved in the top beg to be touched. I do just that, brushing over the curved petals as she spreads the wreath out like a warm blanket. "Did you buy this one, too?" I ask, indicating the stone.

"No," she replies, discretely wiping her eyes again. "It showed up my sophomore year of high school. I came out here one day and there it was."

"Who put it here?"

"I dunno."

I point out the wilting daisies in the concrete vase. "Someone visits her."

Erica looks around at the other memorials. I know what she's doing. She's looking to see if they also have semi-fresh flowers, but they don't. "Hmm."

"Hmm? Is that the best you can do? You could have family after all." I pull a notepad out of my purse and jot down a quick note. Rifling around in my bag again, I find a small zip lock bag that a broken necklace was returned to me in. I put the note inside, then safety pin the bag to a large silk carnation. "Maybe someone will call."

"Don't hold your breath."

I don't.

I can't.

She took my breath a long time ago and hasn't returned it yet.

Home.

There are so many clichés about home. It's where you hang your hat. It's where the heart is. It's 'home sweet home' being advertised on hand painted plaques that you hang over the door.

Before Erica, I had only ever had one home. My parent's home. Most people my age are a few years into a loan, but I never could be bothered to put down roots. Seattle felt like a short stay for me, but as the pilot announces that we are heading into Seattle, I look out over home with a sense of reverence. And relief. And calm. There's a big white house, two cats, and a comfortable bed waiting for me and I can't wait. I can't wait to curl up and sleep like Erica has done for the past two hours.

I don't nudge her awake until we've landed and most of the plane has emptied. She staggers along beside me, looking worn and threadbare, as we collect our luggage and I slide into the driver's seat after we've loaded the car. This? This is how we should have arrived from Miami. Tired, but together. Emotionally exhausted, but strong.

She seems to read my mind because she puts her hand over mine on the gear shifter and says, "Despite our disastrous first trip ... I'd fly anywhere with you."

"Likewise." I navigate toward our house, grateful that traffic is bearable. She massages the back of my hand and I capture her thumb with mine. "I had a great time."

"Me too," she says. "Callie?"

"Yeah?"

"Thank you ... for ... Nebraska."

I glance her way. "Did you just thank me for that? After everything else?"

"I'm glad I waited for you ... to take me. And ... bring me back. I'm glad that no one else ... I wouldn't have wanted to share that part ... of me ... with anybody but you. You saved me, you know?"

That's deep. To lighten the mood, I smile her way. "I'm your savior now?"

"Didn't you know that?"

There's no trace of humor in her voice. I glance at her, then back at the road. "There seems to be a lot of salvation going on then."

"Do I make you as happy as you make me?" she asks, calm and genuinely curious. "Do you feel better when I walk into the room? Do you hear my voice and feel it against your skin? Can you spend half the night watching me sleep and still feel rested the next day? Do I do that to you?"

"All the time," I reply honestly. "Every second of the day."

"Good."

"Thank you for loving me enough."

"Enough to what?" she asks.

"Enough to make me content for the first time in my life."

"The pleasure's all mine."

Addison and Mark are not at our place when we arrive. We leave the luggage and go through the garage like eager kids on the first day of school. You rediscover what a child you are when the creature comforts you take for granted can delight you. The ugly canister set on the counter that I usually try to ignore is suddenly glorious. The familiar creak of the floorboard sounds like a favorite song and the hum of the running dishwasher is as soothing as a lullaby. I open my mouth to tell Erica that we don't need another vacation for a while when Ruma and Feo come charging into the room.

Their hairless status has not seen any marked improvement in our absence. Weaving around our legs and mewling pitifully, our cats welcome us home in grand style. I lift Ruma and hug him while Erica does the same with Feo, crooning to him like he's a baby. Both cats go weightless in our arms as they soak up the attention and when we sit down on the sofa, the cats stay in our laps, purring like little engines.

We stay there for close to an hour and when our pets are satisfied that we're not figments of their imagination, they scamper off, one chasing the other. Their nails don't make a sound on the hardwood and I admire their grace as much as I miss Buddha's clumsiness. Usually the sound of his nails was followed by a thump and a grunt. Always amusing. Like Erica falling off her horse.

I feel gritty from the day, dirty from where I've been and what I've seen. Pain like Erica's at the cemetery can stick to your body like paint. War paint. Sorrow, maybe.

"Let's take a shower," I suggest. "I hate planes."

She doesn't need a second invitation and we're naked and under the pulsating waterfall within minutes. I soap her hair before she can, because she once told me that my nails scrubbing her scalp erases tension from her body. Knowing that I'm doing that for her chases away my own tension and by the time I've washed my own hair, I think I could sleep for days. I quell the urge to yawn when her soapy hands move over my back, washing, massaging. They slide around me ... chasing sleep entirely out of the picture when she kneads my breasts. I'm fully awake, fully aroused, and up for anything as she rubs my chest, teasing, twisting just enough to elicit a gasp.

I put my hands over hers, guiding her, and I feel her chuckle against my ear when I urge her between my legs. She teases my earlobe with her teeth, but it's her breath against it that turns me on so much. I press her fingers against me and feel her tongue trace the soft spot behind my ear. "Oh ... God," I moan, grinding my ass against her crotch.

I reach behind me, skimming her thighs as I seek her center and she parts her legs for me. She's just as aroused at I am. I think the only thing better than what she does to me is knowing that I can elicit the same thing from her. She's wet, supple, and ready beneath my fingers. I spread her apart just enough to graze her clit and she yanks me back against her. It's not slow and seductive that she wants. I turn around, forcing her hand away from me and pin her against the wall. She lets me. She lets me push her hands over her head and pretend that I could hold them there with one of mine if I wanted to. Truthfully ... she could have me on my back in a flash and we both know it.

Leaning into her, I trace the curve of her mouth with my tongue before sucking her bottom lip. When my hand finds her again ... there's no pretence. I'm going to fuck her with my fingers until she can't walk straight and we both know that, too. I feel her foot on the back of my leg as I push into her. She's bracing herself, balancing for the intensity and I don't disappoint. I move so fast, so hard, that the sound of flesh against flesh nearly drowns out her cries. Nearly. Not quite.

She yields fast, giving up, giving in. I don't mind that she claws my back or that she nearly yanks me bald. Because after she rides out her release for less than a minute ... she sinks down on her knees in front of me and I give up trying for any conscious thought at all. She draws amazing designs against me and I let her ... no ... I beg her for more.

I plead with her not to stop ... then I tell her to stop because I could drown any second ... but she's gone deaf. She pushes me until I break with the same guttural intensity and leans her head against my stomach.

The water cools before we do.

We take it to the bed, which Addison has turned down neatly, and fall into a tangle of each other. Our hair is wet and we'll look like hell in the morning, but really ... does the morning even matter when you're living for the moment?

I see her watching me and smile. "What?"

"Your eyes get so glassy when you come. You look stoned."

"Natural high." I touch her neck. "You turn red when you come."

She glances down at the flush on her breasts. "True. Or maybe I'm just embarrassed that you have no stopping sense. The things you do to me ..."

"Excuse me. I'm the molested one. You accosted me on a plane."

She smirks. "Guilty. But you got your kink on in an airport bathroom, skank."

"I wasn't alone, ho. I didn't straddle a toilet seat."

"Ouch."

We settle under the cover, quietly unwinding. Her foot is rubbing the top of mine when she says, "We are getting married."

"No way! Seriously!?"

Her foot kicks me now, lightly. "How do you want to do it?"

"Jumping out of an airplane?"

"I'm serious!"

"As long as it doesn't involve Vegas or the Church of Elvis, I'm fine."

"Do you want the white dress and -"

"My mother would have a heart attack if I attempted to wear white." I move closer to her, pillowing my head on her arm. "Are you trying to tell me you want something traditional?"

"Well, I don't want to wear jeans," she replies. "I don't know. I've never even contemplated marriage until right now."

I look up at her. "You and Rachel -"

"No. I told you ... we stayed as far in the closet as we could get. And there wasn't a lot of talk about gay marriage or anything then. We just ... never considered it."

I'm somewhat comforted by that. There may have been women before me, but I'm the one she wants to pledge her life to. It means that I get to be her first in something the way she was mine. I want to tell her all that, but all I can say is a meek, "Oh."

"Cal?"

"What?"

"I'm not looking back anymore ... so don't you."

"Okay."

"I've decided that everything happens for a reason."

"That's very old news, Yellow."

She kisses the top of my head. "I'm just catching up. I can't be mad that people died and ... left me. I had to be left behind so you could find me."

And there you have it.

This long, rocky and oftentimes heart mutilating journey called life can suddenly make sense after it has scarred you to death. In the blink of an eye you can fall. You can fall from a horse. You can fall on your face. You can fall over good intentions, but the very best way to fall is when someone clutches your hand and you go together. I fell so much in love with Erica Hahn that I didn't know if she was with me for a while, but now I know that she was there all along.

After you fall ... the only thing you can do is rise.

And we're going to soar from here on out.

Only not like a bird, 'cause that's creepy.

We'll make our own wings.


	27. Chapter 27

Firsts.

There is a first time for everything. Your first breath, your first step, your first love. Life wouldn't be life at all without the anticipation of something new, unexpected, and unchartered. On our first day back at work, Erica and I are pulled our separate ways, but are paged to report to ER at the same time. I have seen many, many things in my day, but a woman with a butcher knife embedded in her heart and the bones in her arm exposed is really new for me. The sight of it paralyzes me and I'm captivated by the knife's handle twitching in time with her heart. It freezes me in my tracks for just a split second ... long enough for Erica to yell, "Move your ass, Torres!" like I'm a first year intern.

Excuse ME if I needed a little time to regroup.

I am not as immune as SOME people.

Now I'm pissed.

I note that Dr. Simmons, the head or Ortho and not a fan of mine, is watching me closely and I spring into gear. Lexie Grey pretty much steps up to play for Team Bone while Cristina jockeys with George and Meredith for Team Heart. Erica tags Cristina and I watch Yang do a little wiggly dance move before she makes a face at the two losers. Luckily for them, but not the woman on the stretcher, there is enough mayhem to go around. With Lexie's help, I stabilize the woman's arm and wrap it securely before cardio can even order chest films. I shoot Erica a 'take that' look and walk out to prep for surgery.

Dr. Simmons follows me. I hear him clear his throat behind me, sounding like a frog that has been swallowed by a geriatric crow. "Dr. Torres, a moment please."

A moment for this old bastard is usually an hour and a half of him building up to his point and then another hour of him trying to make it. And almost always, his point is that I have done something wrong. I turn around and try to smile. "Yes, sir?"

He gestures toward the conference room and I shuffle inside like I'm going to the gas chamber. To further solidify that he's in partnership with the Devil, he shuts the door and walks past me smelling like an herbal remedy gone wrong. Cinnamon, sage, and something rancid greet my nose and I'm tempted to wash my face in hand sanitizer just to cut the stench. He sits down across from me and says, "Nice vacation?"

"It was fine."

"Are you settling back in okay?"

"Yes, I am."

His beady, gauzy eyes find mine. "I wanted to speak with you about a couple of things. I think it is in the best interest of the orthopedics department that I address the situation first, before it escalates into something more. Chief Webber does not need to be involved as far as I'm concerned. He has proven himself to be fairly partial of late.

"Dr. Torres, as you know, there are certain policies and procedures in place here at Seattle Grace-"

"With all due respect, Dr. Simmons, I am well versed in our policies and procedures. I have a shiny handbook of my very own, so if you are going to speak to me about fraternization, I would like to remind you that-"

"I wanted to speak with you about harassment." He holds up his hands. I should be grateful to train with a man so skilled, but I'm not. His big hands have pioneered innovative treatments, but they don't impress me. Maybe it's because his finger has wagged in my face too often. "May I be so bold as to call you Callie?"

ZOMG!

"Uh, okay."

"Callie," he says, vibrating my name in the lowest octave I've ever heard it spoken. "Orthopedics has never been as respected as, say, neurology. Or cardio. We're the carpenters. Most of our cases are only life and death to us and never to our colleagues. It's hard for us to earn respect or keep our surgical times because we're the first to be bumped if something more ... interesting ... comes along.

"Because of that, orthopedic surgeons have to rise to a different level. We have to excel in even the most mundane procedures to be recognized. Our field of medicine is, in short, an afterthought." He clasps his hands together. "I have watched you make several choices in your personal life that affected your-"

"My personal life is not open for discussion."

"- performance and I was very lenient because I have been through a divorce as well and I know how difficult it can be. And the reason I am bringing up your personal life right now is because something happened to your property on hospital grounds and the culprit behind the damage is back at work. I don't agree with that decision. I feel that if the victim had been someone from ... say ... neurology ... the vandal would have been terminated. I feel, that because you are a 'carpenter' ... it made your plight less ... important. When you throw in your gender and sexual preference ... I believe that it influenced Webber's decision to allow Stevens to return to work. I don't approve of this"

Really ... he could have compacted his entire statement down to 'Izzie is a be-yotch and I am mad as hell that she's here'. I mull his words before I speak, because I don't want to say anything but the truth. "I really don't think that the Chief cares about my gender, sexuality, or that I'm a 'carpenter'. I think that Stevens won points by exposing the truth and Chief Webber believed her apology."

"I respectfully disagree and because of that ... I have tendered my resignation."

"Why would YOU resign over something that happened to ME?"

"You're in my department. You are my responsibility. It is my job to teach you, to train you, and to guide you. I don't feel that the working environment that has been created by allowing Stevens to remain is conducive to learning. If you become distracted or resort to physical violence with her again-"

"I'm not. I don't care that she's here."

"I won't have my reputation sullied. I'm close to retirement anyway." He gives a shrug of his narrow shoulders like we're not talking about something as important as his career. "You only have a few months left before you complete your residency. I haven't always seen eye to eye with you, but I will be happy to leave you a ... somewhat glowing letter of recommendation."

"Thank you," I tell him. As an afterthought, and not because I mean it, I add, "I'm sorry to see you go."

"We both know better than that." He smiles at me and his entire face changes. He could be sort of human if he really wanted to be. "Good luck to you."

"Same to you." He gets to his feet and shuffles toward the door. I hold my breath to avoid the smell. Then I realize that I have an important question. "Who will be taking your place?"

"I saw Gavin Cole speaking with the Chief this morning."

My eyes widen.

I stop breathing.

Gavin Cole graduated medical school by the time I started, but I'd already heard all about him. His orthopedic research is what lured me away from pediatrics and I wrote my dissertation to include several footnotes in his honor. He's a genius and I could learn more in three weeks under his tutelage than Simmons taught me in six years. I'm still thinking of Cole when Simmons leaves the room and it takes a page summoning me to the ER to remind me that I was on my way to scrub in.

Erica has already opened the patient's chest by the time I get there. She glances up at me as Lexie ties my scrubs and says, "Nice of you to join us."

She's joking.

I know she's joking.

But her words feel like a slap.

I don't reply because my tongue could easily crack against her like a whip. Instead, I set to work and lose myself in the simplicity of medical carpentry and the familiarity of the tools in my hand. I wear the drill like an extension of me and the steady whir drowns out my thoughts.

For a while.

Doctors have to be two people. You can't bring a bad day into the operating room any more than you can take a sick patient home with you. You learn to readjust your thoughts and concentrate as much as you possibly can, but there are times that it's nearly impossible. This? It's one of those times. This drill sounds like the saw that will cut the top of Jasper's head off. Literally. And the smell of the operating room, the glare of the overhead lights, the voice of the anesthesiologist -- that could be the last thing that Jasper ever experiences. Because he could die. He could go to sleep and never wake up. I've purposely tried to NOT think of Jasper because thinking about him inevitably leads to tears blurring my vision, but it's not possible. He keeps invading every aspect of my life.

Just last night ... Erica and I had spaghetti and I wound up crying halfway through because it's Jasper's favorite.

"Callie!"

The drill stops and the sound of the flat lined monitor assaults me.

There's no comfort in the noise. It's final and ugly and brutalizing. I stare at the monitor like I'm unconvinced by the level, undisturbed tone.

The patient has died.

I will never know if I repaired her ligaments and tendons enough for her to grip anything.

And she will never know that I tried.

Really ... not the best way to begin the day.

I put the drill down on the cart and pick up the suturing kit, holding it out toward Lexie. "You want to do it?"

"Yes."

I surrender the reigns and leave the OR. Working on dead people? Not my idea of fun. It's bad enough to pull bones out of cadavers, but touching someone who just died and feeling their warmth inevitably flee is really so depressing that I've considered waitressing more than once.

I'm taking off my surgical gown when Erica comes in behind me. "Are you okay?" she asks. "What did Simmons want?"

"To yell at me some more since you didn't do it enough," I lie.

She stops untying her own gown. "What?"

"Don't yell at me in front of anyone else. Or ... you know, at all."

She looks confused for a split second and then her mouth parts as comprehension dawns. "Ohhh. I'm sorry. I - I couldn't get around you."

I toss my scrubs and pull my cap off. "I'll let it slide ... this time. Next time, though, I'm cutting you off."

She has knotted the ties on her gown so I help her with it and she smiles at me, making that phantom dimple appear in her chin. "Cutting me off? Liar. All I have to do is tell you that I'm wearing blue panties today and -"

"That's cheating."

She grabs the finger that I point into her face and tugs me forward, giving me a quick kiss. "I fight dirty."

It's funny how anger can disappear in the blink of an eye if you'll let it. I nuzzle the side of her face and breathe her in, amazed at how quickly the tension leaves my body. "Simmons didn't really want to yell at me. He's resigning."

"What!?"

"It's so weird. He's pissed that Stevens was allowed to come back and he thinks it's because Chief Webber doesn't respect ortho. We're lowly carpenters, apparently, and if Stevens had trashed your car ... she would have been fired."

"My car did get trashed. Not as bad as yours, but enough."

I consider that for a few seconds. "Maybe Simmons is just looking for a reason to go. But I can't really complain because Gavin Cole is in the running for -"

"Oh my god! He's ... a big deal."

"Yes. He is." I smile at her. "All the best ortho cases would follow him here. This could be huge."

She's wearing the ocean themed scrub cap I gave her and I watch her attempt to straighten it, then do it for her. "Thanks," she says. "I've got another surgery in half an hour, but I'd let you buy me a cup of coffee ... if you wanted to."

"I'd let you see me naked in the on call room ... if you wanted to."

The grin on her face fades slowly. "Do not tease me when I'm about to do a triple bypass. I will not be able to concentrate."

"Who's teasing?"

"You make me break every ethical code I have. What did I tell you about on call rooms?"

"That was BEFORE you went down on me in the one on the third floor."

"Hmm." She purses her mouth into a thin line. "Let's try the the fifth floor today."

"Any particular reason?"

"It's pretty soundproof. And I don't really want everyone to hear you scream."

Excellent.

Why do people always say that they could never work with their lovers?

"Holy crap!"

"Hey, Addy!"

She grabs my hand, staring at the rock on it. "Holy CRAP!"

"I know, right?"

"I want to date Erica Hahn."

"And then enjoy traction." I let her turn my hand left and right, watching the diamond catch the light. "Miranda called it vulgar and Yang told me to pawn it and buy a motorcycle."

"It's very vulgar, but also beautiful." With a wry smile, she adds, "How did she do it?"

"Put it on my finger while I was sleeping."

"Ugh!" Addison wrinkles her nose. "Why in the HELL would she ask me how to do it and let me make a million suggestions if she was going to IGNORE them all!?"

"She talked to you about it?!"

"Yes! I cannot believe she didn't ask you on the vintage car ride through the country or at the Leaning Tower! I even researched whether or not you could go to the top for such a special occasion! I'm gonna kick her ass!"

I suddenly get Erica's mood swings the day we went to Pisa. She wasn't pissed that I paid the mortgage ... she was having a nervous breakdown. I have to wonder why she didn't go through with it then. In retrospect, I think maybe she was going to do it ... because she kept lingering in the tower, nervously glancing around us. Maybe she didn't do it because I was in a bad mood. Or she was.

Great.

Now my thoughts are going to kick my ass all day.

"So, what did she say?" Addy asks. "Please tell me she took my advice on that at least?"

"She asked if I was going to look down at my finger at some point."

"You wait until I talk to her. Just you WAIT!"

"Addy?"

"What?"

"I proposed to her first."

"AND YOU DIDN'T TELL ME!?"

"I don't need romantic advice from the psychotic lunatic who beats the shit out of the person who brings them flowers." I put the chart I'm working on in the decreasing pile and lean back in the chair. "I pulled off what may have been the single most wonderful popping of the question in the history of civilization."

"Do tell!"

"Picture this. Rooftop restaurant overlooking a theater where Erica's favorite opera is going on. We've sailed in a gondola, spent the day at the spa, have on the most beautiful dresses ever made-"

"Oooh, by who?"

"Addison, the designer doesn't matter."

"Not to you!"

"Shut up if you want to hear this."

"What color were they?"

"Mine was yellow and hers was red. Now be quiet." I glare at her until she zips her lips. "So, we have this amazing dinner while people sing underneath us and then the waiter brings out a silver platter. I tell her that all I want out of my life is more time with her."

"Awwww!"

"So, I gave her a watch and asked her."

"You gave her a - CALLIE! A watch?"

"A Rolex watch. And don't even try to act like that's not original. It made her cry and say yes ... so I win!" I have to smile at the memory. "And then we made out in the limo and it was earth shattering."

Addison has an open chart in front of her that isn't holding her attention at all. She is looking at me the same way people look at cute, fuzzy puppies. "You have is so bad."

"Yes, I do."

"And she encourages it."

"Yes, she does."

"And I'm insanely fucking jealous"

"Yes, you are."

"Well, Callie, I got laid in the on call room earlier."

"Fancy that," I tell her. "So did I."

She laughs, swatting me with a wad of papers. "Slut."

I watch her jot something down in her chart, then ask, "So ... you guys are officially back together?"

"We pretty much sealed that in the hot tub at your place." She has to laugh at the expression on my face. "No, we didn't have sex, freak. I tried to drown him."

"You really need therapy."

"I know." She bites the lid on her pen and scowls. "But I really think it was a wake up call for both of us."

"Attempted murder usually is."

She gives me her patented crooked smile and says, "I redeemed myself beautifully."

Go, Addison.

Maybe it's wrong ... but I feel like a cement truck has been lifted off my chest.

Mark is happy.

Addison is happy.

Hell, even with Jasper's surgery looming on the horizon ... I am happy.

I am definitely happy.

Dear God ... this is where it all falls apart, huh?

Erica and I somehow manage to make time for one another at work even though the crazies arrive in full force. One trauma after another rolls into the emergency room over the next few days and we're both bombarded with surgeries. Most of our intimate moments take place in the on call room because it's so late when we arrive home that the most we can do is shower and fall into bed. You know that Erica Hahn is exhausted when she suggests take out for dinner six straight days. We both have Sunday and Monday off and neither of us budge off the sofa to do more than feed the cats on Sunday. Monday finds me the unwilling victim of a shopping trip to the arts and crafts store. Erica buys scrapbooking material while I ponder whether or not I could shove an artificial flower far enough into my aorta to lose consciousness. Shopping? Hate it. And Erica takes her sweet time which I don't mind ... because we are waiting for our vacation photos to be developed ... but I'd still rather bleed out than pretend to be interested in picture borders.

Our day is salvaged by our trip photos, though. We go through them in the car and then immediately return to the photo lab to have quite a few of them enlarged. The shot of us in our fancy dresses the night we got engaged becomes the largest and our next stop is finding a frame big enough to house it. I had almost forgotten how damn beautiful she looks in red. Almost, but not quite. While she shops for frames at the mall, I scour apparel shops and don't stop looking until I find a few red shirts for her. Her wardrobe needs a splash of color and it's like an aphrodisiac to me, which she never complains about. When I meet her in the food court, her arms are laden down with frames and I can only shake my head.

I thought that I was the sentimental one.

Monday night finds us picking and choosing which photos to frame and when I get out of the shower ... I can hear her swearing in the hallway.

I walk out of the bathroom, wrapped in a towel, and I'm stunned at what I see. There's a large box on the floor beside her and all the photographs of Rachel are neatly packed away in newspaper. I know that they're Rachel's photos because the walls are bare. I recover from my shock and realize that Erica has wrapped her hand in the bottom of her shirt "What did you do?"

"Dropped one. Cut my thumb. Right under the nail, too."

"Let me see?" I take her hand and hiss when I see the blood under her fingernail. "Yeah, you did, Yellow."

"I was packing the --"

"Past?"

She nods.

"Why?" I put pressure on her thumb to stop the bleeding and she grimaces. "Erica?"

"I'm ready. To let go. And we have so many pictures to hang that -"

"There's room for her." I raise a brow so that Erica understands that I'm not just talking about Rachel's photo. There's room in Erica's heart to love us both. I would never begrudge her the memory of her first love. I want her to never forget. I want her to see that I am grateful to Rachel for teaching Erica to love herself. "It's okay."

She glances down at the box at her feet. "There is one that -"

"Put it back on the wall."

"Are you -"

I take a step forward and kiss her forehead then lean mine against hers. "I'm positive."

Erica takes the top photo out of the box and brushes a little dust off the glass. It's the shot of Rachel looking happy and healthy while Buddha chews on her hair and Erica sits beside them, watching. Instead of putting it back where it came from, Erica hangs it a little higher and a little further down. When she gestures behind me ... I see that she has brought up the newly framed trip photos. I pick up a stack of them and hold one out. Meticulously and with far too much thought to placement, she eventually covers the wall with our pictures. As I reach the bottom of the pile, my eyes widen. She has framed the photos we took from her grandfather's house as well. They're old and worn, but she has painstakingly added them. I watch her put them in place and point at the blank space that has been left. "What about -"

"I left room for the photographs that Lori Anne is bringing. She said that she has plenty of them."

Her profile is so beautiful as she surveys her handiwork. She straightens a few of the frames and takes a step back, nodding. It's almost like she's convincing herself of something. When she notices my eyes on her, she gives me a small grin. "Do you like it?"

I glance at the wall and nod. Something tells me that even my worst days will improve just walking past so much happiness. We're happy in every photo. "I love it."

She takes my hand in hers and squeezes. "Now ... now it really is our home."

"It wasn't before?"

"It was," she tells me. "But now ... it reflects us both. Not just me. It's prettier now."

I've never been a fan of photographs. My mother has a ton of school pictures where I was making faces or crude hand gestures. One year ... she sent out Christmas cards with our family portrait on it and didn't realize that I was looking as cross eyed as I possibly could. The next year, she was looking at me in the family portrait and I was making a fish face. After that she bought generic Christmas cards and refused to let me sign any of them. The difference in me back then and me now is amazing. While there are a few pictures of me looking furious in Italy because the camera was always in my face ... a majority of them find me laughing or gazing into the lens with such adoration that it's close to repulsive. If I didn't know me and I walked down this hallway ... I'd be incredibly jealous of the black haired woman whose grin seems so genuine that you'd never doubt it. I'd wonder what it felt like to be that content ... but I don't have to wonder. I know.

"Cal?" Erica brushes my hair over my shoulder and kisses my ear. "Think you can play doctor?"

"Oooh." I rub my hands together in eager anticipation. "I call dibs on the strawberry -"

"Actual doctor, baby." She holds up her finger, which is still bleeding slightly. "And then we can break out the 'Love Doctor' kit and you can have the strawberry massage oil."

"It tastes really, really good."

"Yes, I know. I did stay between your legs close to an hour last time."

I bandage her finger in record time.

And I am oh so glad that she didn't hurt her right hand.

Because she uses it very, very well.

I have no complaints.

It's close to ten thirty and we're watching the final moments of some mind numbing sitcom when she sits up in the bed suddenly. I sit up beside her and rub her back. "You okay, Yellow?"

"We're missing a ton of photos!" She shoves the cover back and gets to her feet, pulling the suitcase from under the bed. She pats down the side pockets, looking for a film container. "We took photos with Claudine and Angie. Remember? And you took a ton of me trying to ride that damn horse. I think the clicking of the camera is what made that animal psychotic."

"I used the digital for that. We ran out of film, remember?" I head into the closet and pull the camera down from the shelf, opening the case. I pick up her laptop and connect the two, scrolling through a ton of files. "Good lord! When we do have a baby ... we need to pace ourselves. Otherwise we'll be holding a camera more than we hold the kid."

She grins and climbs back into the bed, fluffing her pillows against the headboard. I slide into the spot beside her and we view a few thumbnails. It feels like we never left. Angie and Claudine are as vibrant in photographs as they are in person. Angie, specifically, resonates from the monitor, her deep, brown eyes crinkled with laughter. Who knew I was such a talented photographer? I somehow managed to capture her in just the right light to make you feel like she's right in front of you. There are two specific photos of just her face, with her halo of white hair, that seem almost angelic, almost ethereal.

"She's beautiful," Erica says, leaning her head against my shoulder. "I wish we could have packed them up and brought them home with us."

"Screw that. I wish we could have packed OURSELVES up and stayed there," I tell her, flipping through a few more files.

There are so many excellent shots of us and our new friends that I'm tempted to send the entire folder to the photo lab, but I refrain. When we're not exhausted we can go through and carefully pick and choose what we want. I stifle a yawn with the back of my hand and scroll to the top of the files, trying to locate Erica on the horse. I definitely want to enlarge a couple of those. As I scan through the file names, which are really just dates and numbers, I notice something out of place. There's a folder with a date a few months earlier ... just a few days after Jasper's birthday. I double click it and see that there is a movie file inside. "What is this?"

"I don't know," Erica replies. "Probably something about how to use the camera. I didn't watch all the videos about it when Hel - uhm - when I got it."

I double click the file and wait patiently for the media viewer to fire up.

And then I wish that I hadn't.

Because what I see is enough to make me want to go blind.

The date on the bottom of the video is the only thing worse than the content.

The day that we got back together ... the Thursday that Erica danced for me in her underwear in Yang's living room ... she fucked Helen.

And filmed it.

I don't even try to stop her as she wrenches the laptop away from me and pounds the keyboard in an attempt to stop the show.

It's not enough. Whatever she's doing ... it's not enough.

I can hear it. I can hear Helen saying that it feels so fucking good. And she keeps saying 'baby' in a breathless, sated way.

And I can hear Erica laughing and telling her that she has the most beautiful breasts she has ever seen ... that she tastes better than anyone should.

Erica slams the laptop closed and grabs my arm. "Callie - Callie, listen to me -"

I don't ... I can't ... make a sound. Or move. Or think. Or breathe.

"Helen gave me the camera and ... well ... I thought she erased everything. She said that she erased everything."

It takes Erica's fingers in my hair to snap me back to the present. I shove her hand away from me and stagger out of the bed. "Don't touch me."

"I'm sorry. I didn't know it was there."

"I'm not stupid!"

"I know that. I didn't -"

"Shut up! Just - shut up!"

"This is not -"

"Look at the fucking date, Erica! Look at it! That was the Thursday that we met for drinks at Warren's! That's the Thursday that you accused me of sleeping with Addison and then-" I turn slowly and I can tell that the expression on my face looks as bad as it feels because she covers her mouth with her hands. "mauled me in that dirty, run down motel. Did you fuck her before or after you fucked me?"

"Don't."

"BEFORE OR AFTER!?"

"Before!" She gets to her knees, reaching for me, but I step away. "I didn't know that you and I were going to get back together. I - I thought you invited me for drinks so you could tell me that you were moving back to Miami or that you wanted nothing to do with me. I never, ever imagined that we would -"

"I have to ... leave."

"No! No, you don't!"

She's on me before I can lift my jeans out of the floor. We play a sixty second tug of war with my pants and I finally let them go. She's pulling so hard that she falls back into the floor, but I don't help her up. I can't help her up. I can't help me up. I may be standing, but most of me is writhing on the floor. I stomp past her and grab a pair of sweats from the laundry hamper and tug them on. I'm already wearing a t-shirt and I don't care that it's ill fitting or has several tears in the sleeve. All I care about is getting far enough away from her that I don't give into the urge to strangle her. Because I'm that pissed. I shove my feet into flip flops and turn toward the door, but she's blocking it. "Move."

"No."

"Get out of the way!"

"YOU CANNOT RUN EVERY TIME YOU GET PISSED AT ME, CALLIE!"

"I AM NOT PISSED, ERICA! I AM SO FAR BEYOND PISSED THAT I CAN'T STAND IT!"

"YOU DON'T GET TO BE MAD! WE WERE NOT TOGETHER AT THE TIME!"

I can feel my nostrils flaring. I can feel the color washing up into my face. And I don't even consider my words before I blurt them out. "It doesn't matter! What matters ... is that you're the kind of person who could have sex with two people in one day! You're disgusting! You're just like George!"

She recoils like I've slapped her.

I seize the opportunity and rush past her.

When I pull out of the garage, gravel flies all over the place because I hit the gas so hard.

I don't know where I'm going, but I can't get there fast enough.

Forty minutes.

I watch every one of those forty minutes tick past on the alien green display of the car radio.

My cell phone has only stopped ringing for about five of those minutes. Leona Lewis keeps telling me that her heart was crippled by the vein that she kept on closing. It's Erica's ringtone. I ignore it until Addison calls. Her ringtone is 'Love in an Elevator', which is the only song I could think of to pay homage to nearly dying with her when we were trapped in the freight elevator at Seattle Grace. I pick it up before it can go to voice mail. "Hello?"

"Where are you?"

"Did she call you?"

"Yes," Addison replies. "Now tell me where you are and I'll come."

"I only got to the end of the driveway," I confess and the fact that I'm pathetic isn't lost on me. I know that I am. I could have gone to Joe's. I could have gone to the Archfield. Hell, I could even go sleep in the on call room at the hospital, but this is as far as I can go. It's like I'm on a chain and the collar around my neck starts choking me when I try to pull too far. I fucking hate it. "Did she tell you what she did?"

"Yes."

"It makes me sick."

"You two weren't together and -"

"Okay, Addison, can you please pretend to be on MY side."

"I'd be upset, too." She exhales on the other end of the line. "I can only imagine how much it must have hurt to see that."

"Falling in boiling water would hurt less."

"Go home, Callie. Just ... go home and go to sleep. It's late and if Gavin Cole's attitude today was any indication of what's to come ... you'll need your rest."

"He was hired?" I ask.

"He started today. You'll meet him tomorrow."

"He has a bad attitude?"

"He's more cocky, confident, and smarmy than Mark Sloan ever thought about being. I hate the guy."

"Oh great."

"Are you going home?"

"Yeah."

"You promise?"

"It's not like I have anywhere else to go."

"You can come and stay with me. You know that. You're always welcome. Mi hotel room es su hotel room."

I have to smile a little. "You're a good friend."

"With great advice. Don't make her worry, Cal. What she did before you -"

"Just a few hours before me!"

"- shouldn't matter so much. It's what she does with you that counts."

"Bye, Addison."

"Bye, Callie."

I toss the cell phone into the passenger seat and start the engine. I have to do a three point turn before I can put the code in the security fence and I know that it will chime inside the house, alerting her that I'm home.

Home.

It leaves a bitter taste in my mouth just thinking about it. Was it really just a couple of hours ago that we were hanging our pictures and rehashing the highlights of our vacation? Italy feels like a million years ago and the happiness that has been blanketing me for weeks feels like it never really happened. All I feel right now is the hollow, haunting weight of the truth. Erica knew that she was meeting me the day that she slept with Helen. She came to me afterwards and regardless of what she expected to happen ... what DID happen was her touching me with the same hands that she had just touched another woman with. God ... I wonder if she even washed them. I wonder if she took a shower before she came to me and - no - I'll go crazy if I keep riding this train of thought. I have to stop.

The gravel crunches under the wheels as I head down the driveway and I can see Erica in the window, silhouetted against the light from the living room. She's watching for me. I open the garage and pull inside, then cut the engine. I grab my phone and my purse before I climb the stairs and she's waiting right in front of the door when I open it. I don't look at her. I can't look at her.

"Callie -"

"I'm going to bed."

"But -"

"I'm sleeping in the guest room."

"I - I'll sleep in there. That bed isn't comfortable and -"

"It's fine." I walk around her, sidestepping the hand she holds out. It's harder than I thought it would be ... to not touch her. To not let her touch me. I stop walking when she clasps my arm. "Erica ... you really don't -"

"Look at me." Her voice breaks over the words and I know that complying with her request will kill me ... but I do it anyway.

I turn slightly and let my gaze move over her face. She's been crying. Her cheeks are still wet and her blue eyes are puffy, swollen, and slightly bloodshot. Her chin trembles pitifully under my scrutiny so I focus on her eyes and say, "I'm looking."

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah. You are."

Her entire face crumbles before my eyes as she begins to sob. Everything in me wants to pull her into my arms and hold on for dear life, but my pride is stronger. My pride ... is what makes me leave her standing there ... choking on her own pain ... while I go to the guest room to deal with mine.

I haven't cried yet.

It's enough to listen to her for what feels like an eternity before I finally fall asleep.

I wake up before Erica and leave before I have to endure anything uncomfortable.

I pretty much break the sound barrier getting to work and have dressed out in my scrubs before the shift change actually happens. I embrace the fact that I'm almost an hour early for my duties and head out to get a jump start on rounds. I'll either be greeted enthusiastically by the patients or they'll yell at me for waking them up before dawn. Either way, I need a distraction. My dreams last night were intense and full of Erica and Helen ... with her perfect body and perfect tits. I didn't see a lot of the video, but I saw enough to know that Helen's body is even better when it's naked than when she's got it wrapped up in absurd little skirts and tight shirts. She's perfect. And Erica obviously thinks so, too, because her face was buried between her legs.

You know, I made peace with the whole ex-girlfriend thing in Italy. I put it behind me and I was never going to delve into it again, but that's easier said than done. It's absolutely impossible to do when the image of it has been burned into your brain so much that it keeps playing in your head on loop. I just ... I can't believe that she would fuck her and then fuck me on the same day. That's what she did to me in the motel room. She fucked me. I didn't enjoy it. I didn't get off. It wasn't pretty ... but later on ... that same night at Cristina's ... she made LOVE to me.

What kind of person starts their day screwing one woman and then ends their night screwing another.

Okay ... Mark Sloan ... would do that.

But that's not the point. The point is ... Erica Hahn was supposed to love me ... even then. The way that I loved her. I kept Mark at arm's length and never let him get close to me until the night I found out that Helen was in the picture, but Erica didn't do the same for me. No ... she had Helen all along. Even after she saw how much it devastated me ... she continued to have Helen. Literally.

"Dr. Calliope Torres?"

I look up from the chart in my hands and nod at the man standing in front of me. I can't imagine why someone so ... grungy ... would be looking for me, but I roll with it. All I register are his dirty pants and the large tattoo on his arm. "Yes. Can I help you?"

He steps a little closer and extends his hand. "I'm Gavin Cole."

I know that my bottom jaw has hit the floor, but I can't reel it back in. I put my hand in his and clasp it firmly while I do a double take on his ripped jeans, the short, but spiky hair, and the faded ACDC shirt he's wearing. His boots are scuffed and dirty and the guitar case he's carrying has definitely seen better days. I realize that I'm still staring when he smiles at me. "Uh, it's nice to meet you," I finally stammer, but that's not exactly true. The mental image I had of Gavin Cole has effectively been squashed to bits. I guess I imagined him as someone dapper and debonair. Or, you know ... clean.

"You'll have to forgive my appearance," he says, gesturing at his attire. "I had a gig last night in Oregon and had to ride like the wind to get back here."

"Like the wind, huh?" I grin at him. "You a singer?"

"I pretend to be and I do it well enough that people let me get by with it." He adjusts his guitar strap and nods at the charts in my hand. "Anything good this morning?"

"Not really. Just doing some rounds."

"Anything ortho?"

"Unfortunately ... no."

"Let someone else do it," he tells me. When I open my mouth to protest, he adds, "Cal, it's like this ... you're an orthopedic surgeon. And if you want to be a good orthopedic surgeon ... then by all means ... do rounds on stomach aches and pneumonia. But if you want to be a fucking amazing orthopedic surgeon, then leave rounds up to the less competent doctors here and come with me."

"But -"

"Good or amazing? Which is it?"

"I'm already AMAZING!"

"Then prove it."

He brushes past me and actually shoulder checks me. It's nice to be enraged at someone who isn't Erica. I drop my charts back where I got them and stalk after him. He's chuckling when I join him in the elevator and I want to punch him in the face when he assures me that I chose wisely. We exit the elevator on the second floor, where the Department of Orthopedics is set up. I follow him into his office and draw up short. It's completely different than it was when Simmons occupied the space. One wall has been painted black and the numerous recognitions, awards, and certificates that Dr. Gavin Cole has earned over the years stand out against it in gold frames. He's rearranged the black desk and replaced the raggedy cloth chairs with leather ones. The futon that Simmons kept pushed against the far wall has been replaced with a black suede couch that looks comfortable as hell. I walk to the bookshelf, where tons of medical volumes (that I actually consulted) used to be. Instead, there are photographs of Cole with all sorts of bands and singers. His collection of famous people is as impressive as my dad's.

"Check this out," he says, causing me to jump at the sound of his voice.

I turn around in time to see him attaching several x-rays to the light panel behind his desk. Even from across the room ... I have to gasp in shock. It's clearly a person's head, but half of the bones are missing from the face and skull. I'm drawn forward, into the light. I barely even breathe as I stare at the films. I've never, in my entire life, seen anything like it.

"Diagnosis?" he asks softly, calmly. "Take a stab at it."

"I don't need to 'take a stab at it'. This may be the most severe case of Treacher Collins Syndrome ever documented," I say, tracing the patient's deformed mandible with my fingernail. "How old is this person?"

"Six," Cole replies, holding out a file folder. "Her name is Emma Foster. She's already undergone several surgeries, but none of them have focused on reconstructing the bone mass in her face. I think that we can do enough to enable her to eat, to breathe on her own, hell ... to speak. I've been trying to get a consult with her parents for two years and they've finally agreed to meet with me."

"Oooh. When?"

"Today." He taps the folder that I'm holding and says, "And if you want to tag along then I suggest that you learn everything there is to know about Emma and Treacher Collins before lunch."

"Jeez!" I cry. "That's not a lot of time, Dr. Cole."

"If you call me Gavin ... I'll overlook the fact that you just whined about time like it's something that matters." He hefts an overnight bag from the closet and winks at me. "I'm going to shower. I'll see you reading that file when I come back. Right?"

"Yes, sir."

"And don't call me 'sir', either."

"How about asshole?" I mumble when he leaves the room.

"I'll only answer to that ... if I deserve it." he calls from the hallway.

Shit.

I hate him already.

Submersing myself in Emma Foster's file and researching Treacher Collins on the internet gives me much needed distraction. While I would much rather being breaking bones and laughing at the screams ... I'm just as grateful for the abundance of information that I've found and filled almost an entire notebook with. My pager slices through my thoughts and I glance at the clock, stunned to see that it's nearly noon. Just as I suspected, Dr. Cole has paged me to the cafeteria and I gather up the information and practically run. I feel very much like Cristina must have felt when she would jump to do Erica's bidding. I can't deny it ... I want in on this case. I want in and I want my name associated with the procedure. It could be groundbreaking and even more than that ... I stand to learn something complex and dangerous which is always a plus in my book.

Cole is sitting with his back to the entrance so I straighten my spine and casually join him. I have to work hard to control my breathing so he won't know that I took the stairs two at a time as I sit down beside him. In his dark blue scrubs and white jacket ... he's not quite as gross, but his spiky hair that sticks straight up in front needs to be tamed with water. Stat. "I've reviewed Emma's case and -"

"What did you learn?"

"Uh ... she's six and -"

"God, save me from residents." He rolls his eyes and crosses his arms over his chest. "What is Treacher Collins Syndrome, Cal?"

"I didn't tell you that you could call me 'Cal'."

"I didn't ask. What I asked ... was for you to tell me what Treacher Collins Syndrome is. And that's all I want to hear."

If I wouldn't go to prison for it ... I'd implant his fork into his eye. "It's a genetic, craniofacial birth defect. It's caused by mutated genes that are passed down by one or both parents."

"And how often does it occur?"

"Approximately one in ten thousand."

"And how is it diagnosed?" he counters.

"Visual assessment is usually the first indicator. Depressed cheekbones, absent ears, downward slanting eyes, and a receding chin are some of the more obvious symptoms, but hearing loss, obstruction of the airway, and certain composites in blood work can also help diagnose the patient."

"Hmm." He stabs half of a strawberry with his fork, his eyes on mine. "Impressive."

That's right, asshole. I am impressive. And you'd be wise not to cross me.

That's what I think.

What I say is, "So, can I help out with the case?"

And I want to implant his fork in MY eye.

He grins, spearing another slice of strawberry. "Why should I let you?"

"Why shouldn't you?"

"You'd be committed to the research?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"And would you give me one hundred percent?"

"Is there a reason why you feel compelled to ask that?"

He chews a grape before he replies. "Would you stop answering every question with a question? Because that's annoying and I don't like to be annoyed."

"Well, I don't like to be grilled like a first year intern. Maybe you should check my employee file and see what it says about my commitment and integrity. That was you could save your breath in the future."

Gavin Cole throws his head back and laughs out loud now. Several faces turn in our direction and I realize how easy it would be to karate chop him in the jugular. I've never disliked anyone so much after one meeting. I guess it's true what they say about first impressions. He has yet to impress me and if he was anyone other than the Premiere Orthopedics God ... I'd tell him exactly what I'm thinking. But I can't. Because he is the Premiere Orthopedics God and there's a strong chance I could work with him. I could LEARN from him. I could put it on my resume and pretty much walk into any hospital in the country and get a job offer. And I have to think about things like that.

Because I only have a year and a half left of my residency at Seattle Grace.

And there's no guarantee that Chief Webber will offer me a position.

"You are exactly what Simmons said you were," Gavin finally wheezes. "You're willful, opinionated, and aggravating as HELL."

"That old bastard -"

"But he also said that you were the best, the brightest, and the one I should bring on board for Emma Foster's case. So here we are." He takes a bite of his sandwich, still grinning. "Yes, Cal, you can work with me on the case. And if you continue to amuse me ... I'll even let you hold the scalpel."

"Hold the - screw that! I help operate or I'm not interested."

He sips his drink and shrugs. "We'll see."

"Yeah, I guess we will."

"You should eat lunch," he says. "If we can get Emma's parents to sign on for this surgery ... it'll be a long day. Research, you know."

I pick up my notes and stuff them under my arm. I nod at him once and head back the way I came, stopping at the vending machine to buy chips and a candy bar. It's not the most nutritious lunch, but I need a sugar rush. After I buy a can of Coke, I head into the resident's lounge and spread my notes out, carefully pouring over everything. I'm attempting to write a rough outline about the procedure itself when the door opens and all of my papers go flying. Erica stands in the doorway for just a second before she sweeps into the room and starts picking up my notes.

"Sorry, sorry," she mumbles and gathers everything before I can push my chair back and help. She holds them out to me and I watch her swallow before she speaks again. "We should talk about what happened last night."

I haven't looked at her face. I can't do it. Anytime she's upset or hurt ... my first instinct is to comfort her. My first instinct is to chase it away. My own hurt, however, prevents me from being overly concerned about hers. "I'm really busy, Erica. I've got this huge case and -"

"And we have this huge problem between us, Callie. We have to address it."

"I'm going to take a page out of your book ... and keep my private life and my professional life separate. If you want to talk at home ... we can do that later. Right now, I'm working." I flip through the papers, trying to put them back in order. "So -"

"You're going to hear me out." She doesn't give me a chance to object. She plows ahead, speaking faster than I've ever heard. "I was with Helen that morning because I knew you were coming back and I needed someone to take my mind off you. I know that's a piss poor excuse because even on her best day ... Helen could never chase you away, but I wanted her to try. I was terrified about what you would be saying to me that afternoon. I had this mental list of things you could be meeting me for. I thought you'd tell me that you were going to give it another try with Mark. I thought that maybe you found a job in Miami. Part of me was convinced that you were going to say that I had no place in your life anymore ... as a friend or anything else. I was scared. So ... I did sleep with her, but my heart wasn't in it. My heart never left you. Callie ... can you please talk to me? Please?"

I put the papers down on the table and entwine my fingers, resting them on top of the notes. I still don't look at her. I focus on a mole at the base of my thumb and say, "If I talk to you right now ... I'm going to say a lot of things that I'll never be able to take back and -"

"You called me George! You can NEVER take that back!"

"- I don't want to fight with you. So-"

"You have no reason to fight with me! We were not together! I was single and what I did while I was single is none of your business!"

Okay, that's it. "NONE OF MY BUSINESS!? NONE OF MY - FUCK, ERICA! OF COURSE IT'S MY BUSINESS! YOU SLEPT WITH BOTH OF US ON THE SAME GOD DAMNED DAY!"

She holds her hands up like she's surrendering, but it's too late for that. "I just -"

"I DON'T CARE! DON'T SAY ANOTHER WORD!"

"STOP YELLING AT ME!"

"I TOLD YOU I DIDN'T WANT TO TALK!"

"YOU'RE NOT TALKING! YOU'RE YELLING!"

I snatch my notes up, shoving them into Emma Foster's case file. She continues talking, telling me all about how she's not to blame and how she had every right to sleep with anyone she wanted to, but the ringing in my ears eventually drowns her out.

There's a small audience outside the lounge and I blow past them without seeing their faces.

Erica doesn't follow.

I don't know how I do it, but I somehow manage to put my best foot forward and convince the Foster family that bone reconstruction on Emma is necessary. Jonathan and Denise Foster have a laundry list of reasons why their little girl should NOT be subjected to more surgeries and I find the right words to reassure them. Dr. Cole is surprisingly silent for the most part, letting me do all the talking. He sits in front of his black wall with his accomplishments glaring out at the Fosters like they speak for themselves. Even when I look at him and implore him to say something, he just watches me and gives me a slight nod. I want to pick up his keyboard and bash him across the head with it.

When the Fosters agree to bring Emma in the following day for x-rays, I know that I have them in the bag. I don't pull out any consent forms, but I do step up my game a notch, assuring them that our staff will go out of the way to ensure Emma's safety during the surgery. They don't shoot me down at all and when I shake their hands, I make sure to hold on a little longer and stare them in the eye. Part of being a doctor ... is being as persuasive as you can possibly be on elective surgery. Especially surgery that can and will alter a child's appearance for better or worse. When the Foster's leave the office, Gavin gives me a shit eating grin. "Nicely done, Calliope."

"Do not call me Calliope."

He points at me. "That's what your jacket says."

"I can deal with Cal, though I'd prefer Dr. Torres."

"Calliope, you did a great job today."

I grit my teeth. "You didn't. You just sat there and -"

"I have found that the best teachers are the ones who let their students test their wings before trying to tell them how to fly." He shrugs, unapologetic. "I don't think you needed my help with them so I didn't give it."

"So your teaching technique is to throw someone in the water and see if they can swim before you show them how."

"Yep. You got a problem with that?"

"No. I can swim just fine."

"I see that." He gets to his feet and picks up a long, leather jacket. "I'll see you tomorrow. I trust you'll have the consent forms signed by the time I review Emma's x-rays."

"But -"

"Just for future reference ... I don't listen to any comment that starts with if, and, or but. Keep that in mind. Excuses are weak and a defeatist attitude makes me physically ill. So ... be a big girl and do your job." He gives me a cocky, lopsided grin. "Any questions? No? I didn't think so."

The first time I met Simmons, he spent close to two hours thumbing through my letters of recommendation and school transcripts while I squirmed in the chair across from him. He was thorough, asking me about the surgery on my hip and why my grades fell slightly after that. He was unemotional and unaffected when I explained about Jasper.

I miss the geriatric asshole already.

It's after ten when I finally make it home. My entire body is aching from hours spent in front of the computer and my right hand needs traction from all the notes I took. I still have to type them all and turn it into something cohesive to present to Chief Webber. I debated spending the night in the hospital to do just that, but the prospect of attempting to sleep in one of the bunk beds is just too much to even consider. I want to take a few Tylenol, soak in a hot bath, and then fall asleep under the ceiling fan. The house is dark when I make my way inside. I can smell something incredible in the kitchen, but I'm too tired to go and forage for food. I find Tylenol PM in the medicine cabinet and take two, then fill the guest bathtub with scalding water. It's not as nice as the garden tub in the master bath, but it'll do. I groan when I recline and the muscles in my neck scream to life.

There is a reason I don't have a desk job.

I'm pruned and nowhere near eased off when I bathe and drain the tub a while later.

With another groan, I push myself upright and pad back down the hall to the guest room.

There's a lap tray on the foot of the bed with a plate full of pasta and a single yellow rose in a small vase. I lift the rose, smelling it, then notice the book that is sitting next to the food. I pick it up and run my fingers over the front ... where the painting that the artist gave us in Italy ... has been copied onto the cover. Apparently Erica took a photo of the painting. Underneath that, it says Italy. I ignore the food in favor of thumbing through the scrapbook. Erica obviously worked hard on it and even though I'm still devastated by what she did ... I can't help but smile at some of the captions she has written. And now I understand why she saved so many things that I was carelessly throwing away. Ticket stubs, maps, coasters, even the napkin that I wrote on ... it's all here ... all in the pages of our book.

I finally cry.

It's a silent outpouring of grief that I keep to myself.

And the Tylenol PM kicks in before I can go and tell her that it's beautiful.

I fall asleep with it open on my chest ... dreaming about a time when I would have sworn we were invincible, but now ... I just don't know.


	28. Chapter 28

I can't think of anything better to wake up to than the smell of bacon frying. It takes me back to growing up in Miami. Mom never failed to cook a full breakfast every single day. She refused to let us go to school with a less than full stomach, but the best breakfast always came on Saturday. With no school looming over us, Mom would take her time and put together omelets and pancakes and canapés. And she'd let us eat in the living room with Saturday cartoons blaring. Jasper and I always flopped out on our stomachs with our chins propped in our hands while we waited for Mom to finish cooking and the smell of bacon would make both of our stomachs rumble with greedy anticipation. We'd gorge ourselves while the Smurfs ran from Gargamel and drink glasses of fresh squeezed juice while we laughed at Scooby Doo. Then we'd run our fingers through the syrup on the plates until we got every last drop. I never had to be an adult with Jasper. I never had to pretend that being ten years older than him mattered at all. He kept me young. He reminded me that there was magic in animation and laughter in a talking dog.

Lazy Saturdays ... I hope I can pass that down to my kids one day.

I hope they'll let me join them on the floor and allow me see life through their eyes for a while.

I remember that it was a beautiful view.

Stretching, I attempt to pop my back and stifle a yawn at the same time. I fail on both counts and when I push myself into a sitting position I have to groan. Erica was right about the bed in the guest room. It's not exactly comfortable and I've tangled myself in the cover in an attempt to get away from the torturous mattress. I'm in the process of unwrapping myself when the door opens and Erica walks in. She glances at the tray on the foot of the bed, where my untouched dinner is still resting, and a frown line appears on her forehead. I only look at her long enough to register that she obviously cried most of the night. Her nose is red. Her eyes are bloodshot.

"Did you eat dinner last night before you got home?" she asks softly and the roughness in her voice reinforces that my suspicions are correct. She definitely cried. "Callie -"

"No, I didn't," I tell her, getting to my feet.

"I made breakfast."

Rubbing my hand over my face buys me a few seconds. I massage the back of my neck as I say, "I need to go in early and -"

"No, you don't. I called Richard and told him we'd be a little late this morning. We have to talk."

"I can't be late." I fumble for my cell phone and check the time. "Fuck! It's after eight!"

"Richard was fine with it. Neither of us have surgeries and -"

"I have a meeting with Gavin at eleven, Erica! I'm supposed to have all this shit," I gesture at the notes that I brought home with me, "typed up and on his desk before that!"

"Gavin? You work with him one day and you're already calling him Gavin and you're apparently his personal secretary?" She crosses her arms over her chest. I see her out of the corner of my eye. I still can't look at her full on ... because looking at her makes me relive what she was like on that fucking video. "I am asking you to TALK to me. I am BEGGING you to talk to me."

"And say what!?" I cry.

"How long are you going to sleep in here?!"

"Until I don't want to anymore!"

"If we're going to dredge up the past and be pissed at each other for it ... then maybe I should be pissed at you for calling me a whore that day in the hospital. Maybe I should be infuriated that you fucked me in Miami and then didn't speak to me after that. Maybe I should bring up Mark Sloan and the fact that you had the best sex ever with him the night you found Helen here with me."

I stalk past her and go into our bedroom, where I rummage through the closet for something to wear.

She follows me and continues her tirade. "Do you not see how stupid this is? You're pissed at me for nothing. I did not know that Helen was filming us. I stopped by her house that morning to pick up earrings that I had left there and one thing led to another -"

"Oh, spare me the fucking details!"

"I didn't KNOW that she was filming it until after the fact! She thought it was funny! She had bought the camera for me and had it on the mantle. I was furious when I saw what she had done and I told her to erase it! I took the camera with me and I told her then that I never wanted to -"

"I really don't care."

"WELL, I DO!" Erica shouts and her voice vibrates around the closet like a gong. It makes me jump and drop the pants I just pulled off the hanger. She reaches down to retrieve them, shaking her head. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to yell ... but I'm scared. I'm terrified, okay? It's never been like this between us and I don't know what to do. I just - you won't even look at me and I can't stand that."

Her voice cracks and so does my resolve. I don't snatch the pants from her. Instead, I take them gently and meet her eyes for the first time in what feels like forever. "I'm looking."

"I'm sorry," she says and I doubt that she can see me at all because she's swimming in an ocean of tears. "I never wanted to hurt you and I did. I can't even imagine what seeing that must have felt like for you and I wish I could change it. I'm sorry. I swear to God, though, Cal ... being without you these past two nights has nearly killed me. I need you. I don't know how to not need you."

My jeans suddenly feel like a fully loaded barbell in my hands. I let them fall to the ground when she sobs and I walk across the small space, pulling her into my arms. She sags against me, clutching at the back of my shirt as she tells me again and again how much she loves me, how much she needs me, and how much she wants to fix what's broken. I don't bother telling her that what's broken inside me has splintered into so many pieces that it would take an eternity to find them all. She's hanging onto me like we're fine and I don't have the heart to tell her that we're anything but fine. I don't think I have a heart at all right now. It was effectively silenced by the fact that she could touch Helen ... and then touch me in the span of hours. I feel dirty. I feel wronged.

"Take the day off." She takes a step back, kissing my forehead, then my cheek. "I'll call Richard and tell him that we both have food poisoning or -"

"I can't." I pick up my jeans again and tug a shirt off the hanger. "I'm working on a big case and -"

"We need this."

"We're both off in a couple of days. We took off for Jasper's pre-op, remember?"

"I don't have a couple of days in me, Callie!" she cries. "We can't live this way! You can't sleep in the other room or -"

"Erica -"

"- stay out late at night to avoid me. This isn't what we do. You talk to me and I talk to you and we work through it! You ... you're giving up! Don't do that to us! Don't do that to me! Please!?"

I close my eyes and count to ten. When I open them she's rubbing her own and her shoulders are hitching under the weight of her mostly silent sobs. It's such a simple, pedestrian thing to do, but I feel it like a sucker punch in my gut when she grinds the heel of her hand against her eye and the dark smudge underneath stands out under the stark light in the closet. It slams me back to the cemetery, when we kneeled at her parent's grave and I clung to her to dull the pain. I am causing it now and no matter how pissed she makes me ... knowing that she is shedding one tear over me is enough to buckle my knees. I rub a tear off her cheek and say, "Why don't you take the day off and get some rest? I'll try to be home early tonight."

"And we'll talk then?"

"Whatever."

She takes my hand in hers, clinging to it. "Are we okay?"

"I don't know. I really ... I just don't know." I squeeze her fingers and try to give her what hopefully passes for a decent smile. "But if we can be ... I want to be."

"We can."

"I hope so."

She lets me walk past her and I get dressed in the bathroom. When I come out, hair piled on my head because there's really no help for it, she's lying on her back in the bed. I pull the cover up over her chest and kiss her forehead. "I'll see you later."

"I love you." There's a hopelessness in her voice when she says it; the same hopelessness that a doctor feels when they tell someone that they 'believe' they got all the cancer. It almost sounds like a prayer.

I rub my thumb over her cheek and the lump in my throat makes it difficult to speak at all. "I love you, too."

There's nothing hopeful or hopeless in my tone.

I accept that I don't know if I can forgive her.

The same way that I accept that I'll never not love her.

Neither makes me feel very good at the moment.

I was wrong when I said that Simmons was long winded. I make it to the hospital by nine thirty and Gavin Cole is still reading me the riot act at fifteen minutes after ten. Forty five horrible, slow, and exasperating minutes pass and I can't get a word in edgewise. He decides to tell me his life story and even though I pointedly yawn and pretend to doze off in the middle of it ... he won't SHUT THE FUCK UP. He paces back and forth, slapping the hand written notes I brought in against the palm of his hand like they're worthless. They are NOT worthless. I happen to have excellent penmanship and what would he do if computers had never been invented anyway. Fuck him. I'd like to shove the notes up his ass and yank them out his mouth and then punch him with them clutched in my fist.

"When I asked you if you could give me one hundred percent, Calliope, that was my way of subtly demanding one hundred and fifty percent at all times." He puts his hands on his hips, glaring at me. "Well?"

"Well what?"

"Explain yourself."

"Oh! You mean I get to speak now?" I lean forward and snatch the notes out of his hand. I snap the wadded up mess open and smooth it out against the arm of the chair. "In the forty five minutes that you have been charging back and forth in here like a maniac ... I could have gotten this typed up, so you have no one to blame but yourself. And the fact that I was still here at ten o'clock last night proves that I am at one hundred and sixty percent committed to this case. If you think you can find another resident who is willing to work late doing research so YOU won't sound stupid when you start talking to the family ... then go ahead. "

He tilts his head to one side and I swear the ghost of a smile moves over his features for a split second. "You're obviously in a bad mood."

"No shit, Sherlock."

"I would advise you not to bring your personal problems into my office."

"My personal problem is IN this office. And since you don't know what subtlety is ... I'll point out that I'm talking about you," I growl, trying to smooth out a particularly bad wrinkle on an important page of statistics. I overestimate my strength and rip the paper down the middle. "Now look what you made me do."

He picks up his tape dispenser and pulls off a piece, holding it out to me. "Please tell me you don't have PMS."

I narrow my eyes into such tiny slits that I can barely see. "Please tell me you didn't just go there."

"Look, you need to be the same upbeat and peppy cheerleader you were yesterday if we want to get the Foster family to -"

"I have never been nor will I ever be an upbeat and peppy cheerleader. The mere suggestion of something that ... grotesque ... will get you drawn and quartered." I pluck the tape dispenser out of his hand and repair the damage to the paper without his help. "Maybe the Foster family wouldn't be so leery if you could prove that you've mastered the simple things ... you know ... like a comb and an iron."

Apparently my insult hits the mark because Cole stands up and opens the closet, staring at his reflection in the long mirror. "I suppose my scrubs are wrinkled."

"You look like you've dressed yourself in elephant skin."

"I didn't know elephants came in navy blue."

"Apparently jackasses do."

"Ow. I'm wounded. Really." His eyes meet mine in the mirror. "While you were here sacrificing yourself on the Altar of Research and Righteous Indignation ... I was on a conference call with a doctor in Russia. He's emailing us the links to video of a similar procedure on a boy with Treacher Collins Syndrome. If you think trolling the internet for information was hard ... you should attempt to carry on a conversation with Vlad Dracula."

"Dracula was from Romania. Not Russia."

"Who the hell cares?" he asks, pulling a can of Static Guard from his backpack. "I needed a translator to translate my OWN thoughts after we hung up. He kept saying 'Ve vant to vork vith you even zo you are ze ebil Vesterners'."

"That was a pathetic accent."

"Lost a lot of brain cells on the phone with him."

I watch him spray himself from shoulder to heel and cough when the scent reaches me. "Great. You look like an elephant ass, but you smell like a rain forest."

"You're obviously running out of material. I'm glad." He drops the can into the trash and pats his hair. "You ready for this?"

"Sure," I mumble dryly.

"Try not to sound so excited, Calliope, really. I can't handle such enthusiasm for our craft."

"People who are repeatedly called 'Calliope' can't show enthusiasm because they're too busy plotting death."

He laughs.

I seethe.

"I can't wait to meet your husband," he says, pointing at my left hand. "I need to ask him if he put that big rock on your finger before or after he got to know you."

"I'm not married," I tell him. "I'm engaged and she knows me better than anyone on earth ever could."

His eyes widen and he does a double take on the ring, then absently pops his knuckles. If I had known that my sexual orientation would render him speechless ... I would have announced it when I walked into his office this morning. Or at the very least ... I would have worn my 'I love chicks, not dicks' button. It lights up and everything. He picks up Emma's chart and glances at the clock. "We should get a move on. Our first priority is getting those consent forms signed. I'm going to let you walk them through the actual procedure itself." He grins. "You know, because your notes are so top notch. And I don't have a set of my own."

"You're right. My notes are amazing. And you seem to know everything so you don't need them." I follow him down the hallway and step into the elevator with my nose buried in said amazing notes so that I don't make a fool of myself.

"Hey, Callie."

I glance behind me and smile when I see Mark. He's leaning carelessly against the back of the elevator and he's wearing the cocky smirk that usually comes directly before or directly after mind blowing sex. Judging by the raspberry colored hickey on his neck, I'll go with the latter. "Hey, you." I rub my neck and wink at him. "Are you having a ... productive ... morning?"

Mark's smile widens. "Perhaps you should ask Dr. Montgomery about that."

"Oh?"

"Ohhhh yeah," he drawls, wiggling his eyebrows enough to make me giggle like a ... cheerleader. God, I need help.

I give him a thumbs up, letting him know that I'm happy for him, letting him know that I approve, and he nods. I'm pretty sure that the tattoo I left on his heart has been covered up beautifully. Addison wrote her name over mine and I doubt that you can see that I was ever there at all. I'm relieved. And sort of nostalgic all the same. Maybe I was only ever meant to be a speed bump on his path back to Addison.

"Excuse me," Gavin says, turning to look at Mark. "I'm sure whatever you did with this Dr. Montgomery was titillating, but I don't want to hear about it and I'm pretty sure that my resident needs to focus on her job."

Mark pushes away from the wall, spreading his feet out shoulder width. "Is Webber paying you extra to be the thought police?"

"What you pay by the hour for the use of the on call room more than covers my fee," Cole replies nonchalantly.

Oooooh.

Damn.

Mark's face turns eleven shades of red as the doors slide open. He takes a step forward and I move between him and Cole, shaking my head emphatically. I'm saved by the arrival of Derek, who magically appears in the doorway as if he sensed a disturbance in the elevator force field. He puts a hand on the door to prevent it from closing and says, "Mark, you're needed in the ER."

"Someone may have popped a tit. Or maaaaybe someone's ass implant is coming out sideways," Gavin says dramatically. "Go be productive as a doctor since you've proven your mettle as a stud today."

Turning his attention to me, Mark says, "I don't like him."

"Me either," I assure him, patting his arm. "Walk away."

Mark walks between us, brushing against Cole on the way out. Cole chuckles and hits the button for one more floor. "Plastic surgeons are all the same," he says before the doors close. "They build the perfect woman and sleep with as many as they can to compensate for their own little -"

An arm shoots between the doors and I shove it back out. I finally breathe when the elevator begins to ascend once more. "When he kicks your ass," I say, "I'm not setting your bones! You have it coming!"

"You should be more concerned about his bones. And his lack of professionalism on the job."

"Like you've been the model of -"

"Watch and learn, Calliope. Watch and learn."

If there's a lesson in working with Emma Foster ... she teaches it, not Gavin Cole. I fall in love with the little girl at first sight. Even though she is partially blind, she walks right up to me and holds her arms up, waiting for me to lift her. She's light as a feather as I pick her up and she pats me on the shoulder as if she's reassuring me that she's happy to see me. Both of her eyes protrude and turn downward at the corners. Her left eye is milky and no use to her, but her right eye is dark brown and so expressive I can barely look into it enough. It's like a brown crystal ball into her soul. There are tubes running out of her nose that aid her in breathing and a band around her throat that holds in her tracheotomy tube. The most shocking thing about her appearance, however, is the absence of her lower jaw. It makes her bottom lip and tongue flap helplessly with no support at all. And the constant air exposure has left her tongue swollen and dried out. This is what we hope to correct by taking two of her ribs and shaping them perfectly to recreate what she was not given in the womb. If we can build her a jawbone and teach her how to use it ... her life will change.

If this is carpentry ... then we're really just God's architects and builders all rolled into one.

I hold Emma in my lap, where she happily plays with the round end of my stethoscope as I walk her parents through the procedure. Derek has loaned us one of his gel filled heads and Emma holds it for me in her strong, perfect hands while I point to a few key places on the face to show where the incisions will be and what will take place once we're inside. When I mention Emma's ribs, she lifts her shirt and points at her side. She's listening intently to me, hanging on every word I say, and for reasons unknown to me ... I'm oddly touched by that. There is nothing at all wrong with her brain, but her face doesn't match.

Just like Jasper's face is too handsome and flawless for his broken brain.

God has a strange sense of humor.

I tickle Emma's ribs and I think she laughs. It's more of a snorting, sucking sound that makes her mother use a syringe to clear her airway. Emma tolerates this and doesn't move, doesn't flinch, and doesn't take her one good eye off me. If I don't do anything else with my career ... I want to give this little girl the ability to laugh out loud. I don't care if her jaw is never strong enough to chew or if we can't align it perfectly to keep her tongue inside. As long as she can laugh and I can hear it one time ... it'll be enough for me. Emma Foster could be the highlight of my career even without surgery. When she touches my face and makes that snorting sound again ... I goose her once and smile down at her, rubbing a champagne blond curl off her forehead.

She does the same for me, pushing my bangs aside.

I touch her nose.

She touches mine.

I tug her ear.

She tugs mine right back and snorts again.

I don't even realize that the Fosters have signed the consent forms until Emma dozes in my arms and Gavin taps me on the shoulder. My back is killing me from sitting upright with no support and I ease the little girl into her father's outstretched arms, pausing to give her a kiss. The second I mention consent, Gavin holds up the papers and tells me that everything's covered. In two days ... I will be assisting on a surgery that will not only put my name in the books ... I'll be giving a faceless little girl a jaw that I hope she can clench in exasperation. I walk the family to their car and head back inside, famished.

Cafeteria food is really nothing to write home about, but I don't feel like going to Joe's today. I want to sit and read my notes again and make sure that I can help Dr. Douchebag perform the perfect surgery on the perfect little girl. I have my notes tucked under my arm as I weave through the lunch crowd in search of an empty seat. I want to be alone so I shake my head at Lexie, who frantically waves at me and points at the chair beside George. I also decline an offer from Cristina, who invites me by kicking an empty chair into my path which I almost trip over. Luckily for me, Sloan's reflexes are as quick as ever because he catches me before I can face plant.

"Thanks."

"You know what," he says, "thank me by filing some kind of complaint against Dr. McAss and get him the hell out of here."

"Dr. McAss is the best McOrtho that ever lived."

He scoffs, waving a hand to dismiss the idea. "Carpenters are a dime a dozen. You could go out on the street corner and find a construction worker who could do the same thing that he does. And they'd probably have a better attitude because the pay is so much fucking better."

I grit my teeth hard enough to break them and point at my badge, which proudly announces that I belong to the Department of Orthopedics. Mark's eyes widen and he backtracks beautifully. "Uh ... I didn't mean you, Cal. You are not a carpenter. Well, I mean, you are, but well ... you're a better carpenter than Jesus."

I have to laugh at that. "One day ... Jesus is going to hit you with a bolt of lightning and I'm going to belly laugh."

He picks up the chair and kicks it back toward Yang. "I pity you having to work with that son of a bitch."

"Trust me, I've been drowning myself in a pity pool of my own." I pluck a French fry off my tray and chew it. "I feel a good old fashioned round of hazing coming on. I need to make him suffer."

"Oh, I'm the king of torment. Leave it to me." Mark helps himself to half of my sandwich. "I'm finished. Take my seat. Addison should be here soon."

"You're not going to eat with her?"

"Can't. Surgery. McAss was right about the popped tit. Some stripper got punched and now she's carrying around a breast so full of saline that it's sagging to her belly."

"Nice imagery."

"No, nice imagery would be telling you that she's left it like that so long that I'll never be able to repair the stretch marks." He eats another fry. "See you later."

I watch him go and pick up what's left of my turkey on wheat. I'm a couple of bites into it when my pager goes off. Food will have to wait. Trauma, thy name is me.

What awaits me in the Emergency Room is nothing short of jarring. Jerry O'Malley has the worst case of road rash I've ever seen and I'm pretty sure that the dirt bike I've been hearing through the woods the past few days is to blame. His left shoulder is obviously dislocated and his right wrist is swollen out like a softball has been implanted under the skin. George meets me with his brother's x-rays before I can do little more than greet the O'Malley family. Louise is crying while she gives her son a tongue lashing that would rival anything my mother has ever said to me. I put the films up and confirm the dislocation and the wrist fracture. Neither will need surgery and I'm personally so grateful for that I could cry. I do NOT want to operate on my ex brother in law. It's just ... strange.

"So, Jerry," I say, lifting his left hand while I prod his shoulder. "Tell me what you were doing today."

"That asshat," Jerry replies, pointing at Ronnie, "bet me a hundred dollars that I couldn't jump a ramp he built."

"You couldn't!" Ronnie snaps. "Obviously!"

"It was shoddy workmanship!" Jerry growls, looking up at me. "The damn thing fell apart and I went over the ... HANDLEBAAAAAAARS!! AHHHH! OH MY GOD!!"

His shoulder goes back into place without much prodding from me and you can hear a pin drop in the room because of the silence that descends. I don't think anyone is breathing. I take the sling that George holds out and fit it around Jerry's neck. He won't look at me and I chuckle a little. "It hurts less if you don't know it's coming."

Jerry exhales and I can smell sour cream and onion chips on his breath. "Are you going to do that same thing to my wrist?"

"Nope," I pat him on the shoulder and he hisses. "I'm going to rely on gravity to do it for me."

"Oh god," Ronnie cries. "What's that!?"

"Gravity?" I ask, brows up high.

"Yeah!" Ronnie says. "It sounds bad."

Louise meets my eyes and says, "Don't look at me. I merely brought them into the world."

By the time Jerry is connected to the proper equipment, I'm ready to go home. My back still hurts from holding Emma for over two hours and even though I don't know what's going to happen when I talk to Erica ... I want nothing more than to put my head in her lap and let her rake her fingers through my hair until I can effectively put this day and our fight behind us. I change in record time and actually have the exit sign in sight when Dr. Cole calls my name from the breezeway. Like an asshole, I stumble when he says 'Calliope' a second time. If I hadn't stumbled, I could pretend that I didn't hear him. Or, you know, tell him tomorrow that hearing that name causes instant deafness, but I can't do that now.

I make it too obvious that I heard him.

"Yes, evil overlord?" I snap, turning and looking up at him. He's dressed in his jeans and another logo t-shirt and if it's possible ... his hair is standing up even more. If I had a slingshot, I'd aim something at his forehead because he looks that damn smug. "What!?"

"You weren't thinking of leaving were you?"

"Uh, yeah?"

"You came in late," he tells me and his voice is carrying all over the lobby. People are looking. "And we need to review the surgery that Vlad sent us."

"Can we do that tomorrow?"

"If I wanted to do it tomorrow ... I wouldn't bring it up today." He points back toward the elevator I just exited. "I'll meet you in my office."

"Fuck," I mutter under my breath.

Cristina enters the elevator with me and she's got a sardonic smile on her face. "You know," she says, "I think I'm glad that Hahn has a hands off approach with me. She doesn't want me around enough to make me jump through flaming hoops."

"Shut up."

Yang laughs and pats my arm. "On the plus side ... he's hot in that Cobain meets Captain Jack meets Brad Pitt way."

"No, he's ugly in that Satan meets a Chia Pet meets a slapped ass way. I mean, who wears their hair that way!?"

"I like him." Cristina shrugs. "Egotistical doctors are so much better than the modest ones."

"Bullshit."

"Who's a better surgeon ... Bambi or me?"

"Bambi was the heart in the elevator guy."

"And I was the first year intern who single handily salvaged Preston Burke's career by performing most of his surgeries solo. I win."

The doors open and Gavin is waiting. He looks me over, gazing a little too long at my Ramones shirt, then he turns his attention to Cristina. "Hello, Dr. Yang."

"Dr. Cole," she replies and her voice oozes the kind of professionalism that I have never been able to muster.

"I'm Dr. Torres, yay, we're all introduced. Can we get on with it?" I adjust my purse strap and tap my watch. "I have things to do."

"Is she always so ..." Gavin begins.

"Bitchy?" Yang offers. "Always, sir. And ... I overheard that you have a video of a bone graft from Russia and I was wondering if -"

"You want to watch?" Gavin offers, acting like he just took the moon and stars out of the sky and has offered her first choice of what she wants for herself. "Absolutely. Incidentally, Dr. Yang, I watched you assisting Dr. Hahn yesterday on the heart transplant. Your technique is to be commended."

"Thank you, Dr. Cole," Cristina nods her head and because I know her ... I know that she'll go into the bathroom at the first chance to jump around and dance with glee over the complement. She'll shimmy, shake, and goose step while she sings a song of her own creation that makes it clear she's the best doctor who ever graced the face of the earth. "Cardio is my calling, but I've always been fascinated with orthopedics."

I have a tendency to tune out bullshit. Actually, I have a bullshit meter built right into my psyche and it's currently beeping loud enough to drown out the conversation so I trail after the liar and McAss with blessed deafness. He leaves handling the laptop and getting the video to play on the big screen on the wall up to me. It takes me nearly thirty minutes and by then ... I've tried and failed to tune them out any further.

They don't talk about anything except medicine, but by the time the video starts ... I feel like I've been spying on someone's foreplay and I can't wait to go home and take a hot shower to drown the mental image.

Yang apparently has a crush.

And McAss apparently enjoys being crushed.

I want to hit the both with a sledgehammer and call it a night.

Russian surgeons are incredibly long winded. McAss apparently agrees because he shuts off the video after he nods off and I elbow him in the ribs. When he tells me we'll pick it back up the following day, I get that same sense of happy elation that a child gets on the last day of school when the final bell rings. I'M FREE. I practically run to my car and I can't even pretend to be shocked when I see that it's almost ten. I'm not only famished, I'm exhausted. I'm so tired that I actually worry about dozing off on the drive home so I turn the radio up full blast and roll the windows down so the cool September air can keep me awake. And I don't think about work. What I think about is the fact that Erica's birthday is coming up next month and she has already threatened me. She does not want a party. She does not want me to acknowledge it at work or make a big deal about it. She wants me to take her to the restaurant on top of the Archfield and not do anything out of the ordinary.

She obviously knows me better than that, but I let her get her threats out of the way all the same.

All the lights are off in the house when I pull in and I hate that the garage door is so noisy. If Erica is sleeping, I don't want to wake her up.

I don't want to wake her up because I'm terrified of 'the talk' that she keeps saying we need to have.

I sit in the garage for five minutes before I go inside and Erica's been cooking again. Something smells amazing and I make a beeline for the kitchen. It's a shock to my system to realize that all I've had in a couple of days is a few bites of a sandwich and a couple of French fries. My stomach gurgles to life as I try to find the source of the smell. I locate it on the dining room table and my appetite goes out the window.

Erica cooked lasagna and set the table beautifully. There's a bottle of wine that would have been chilling in ice a few hours ago, but now it's submerged in water, the condensation pooling on the table. Two large, unlit candles sit next to the lasagna and the plates that she set the table with are the fancy ones she keeps in the China cabinet. Two empty wine glasses remind me of how empty I feel inside and I hate myself for missing dinner with her. I hate myself for not calling her to tell her I'd be late. I hate myself for being pissed at her for being human and flawed. And most of all ... I hate myself for the pride that refuses to let me suck it up and go crawl in bed with her.

I put the lid on the lasagna and put it in the fridge, then I put away the dishes and mop up the water that soaked the table. When I finally go upstairs ... I linger in the hallway, torn between two doors. I could go into the guest room and fall into bed ... or I can go into the master bedroom and see if she's still awake. I worry my bottom lip between my teeth as I try valiantly to push the nagging voice out of my head that keeps telling me that she betrayed me. That voice comes complete with a play by play of Erica's acting debut with Helen and I can't ... I just ... can't do it.

I also can't face another night in the guest room.

I go back to the living room and sit down on the sofa.

I guess I'm so exhausted that I don't need to stretch out because I'm still sitting up when Erica shakes me awake the following morning. She doesn't speak to me as she puts my clean scrubs on the coffee table and tucks her own navy blue ones into her bag. I reach out to touch her hand, but she pulls back before I can make contact and slings her purse over her shoulder. Her eyes never meet mine as she takes her keys off the hook beside the door and she leaves before I can think of a single thing to say. I get to my feet when the door closes and it's like standing up in an endless, silent cavern and realizing that you're completely alone and no one is there to hear you cry.

That's exactly what I do in the shower.

And I'm still doing it when I park my Infiniti next to her Lexus in the deck at the hospital.

At least our cars can be close.

We're certainly not.

Maybe it's the full moon.

Maybe it's the full moon or I'm having a nightmare.

I walk into the cafeteria after watching hours of poorly filmed video and find Addison sitting with Erica. They both look at me when they see me staring, they both scowl like I've slapped them, and then they turn back to one another and start talking. I'm sure they're talking about me because my ears start ringing incessantly and I do the brave, grown up thing ... I turn around and leave the cafeteria in favor of the vending machine in the resident's lounge. Let them be pissed at me if they want ... I'll love myself enough to eat two packs of Twinkies and chase it with a Dr. Pepper. Or two. Possibly three. Take that.

I'm finishing off the first pack of sugary goodness when the door opens and Addison walks in. She nods at a couple of people before she joins me at the small table I've taken refuge at. Not waiting for an invitation, she pulls out the chair next to mine and helps herself to my unopened pack of snack cakes. She takes a bite, licking the creamy filling off her top lip while she glares at me. I slump back in my chair, trying to show her that I don't want to fight with her, but she doesn't read body language very well. She never has.

"You're fucking up," she tells me in a low voice, glancing behind her as the two doctors that were watching television leave the room. Now that we're alone, she speaks in a normal tone. "Callie, I'm your friend and I pretty much adore you so I'm going to tell you like it is."

"If you adore me ... keep it to yourself."

"No." She shakes her head and takes another bite. "You're punishing her for doing the same thing you did."

"I did not sleep with Helen!"

Addison shoots me a look that shows her exasperation. "You were broken up with Mark when you slept with Erica ... the same way that Erica was broken up with you when she slept with Helen. And I know that you don't want me to inject logic into this little tantrum of yours, but you've told me everything that transpired between you and Mark and Erica so I want to remind you that you left Mark here at the hospital the night he tried to make love with you after your surgery and you went to her ... where you would have slept with her if Helen had not been there ... and then you went home and had sex with Mark. So, how exactly are you in a position to judge her when you would have done the same thing?

"I know that it hurt to see that video. I know it did. I know that it shocked you and pissed you off beyond words and you feel like she wronged you but she didn't. You destroyed her ... repeatedly ... and if you blame her for trying to find comfort anywhere she could get it after that ... then you pretty much suck." Addison takes my Dr. Pepper out of my hand and takes a sip. "She loves you. You love her. And yeah ... there were other people involved, but it's not like she slept with her after the two of you got back together. And you know what? She never would have slept with her at all if you had not acted like an idiot after Miami. She was ready to commit to you then. She knew she loved you and you pushed her away. You moved in with Mark and for all she knew you were sleeping with him. So don't you dare act like you have a right to play the victim in all of this. You're not."

I accept the can when she holds it back out to me, but I don't drink it.

Why in the hell does Addison Forbes Montgomery Shepherd Montgomery always have to be fucking right?!

I keep holding Erica up to a ridiculously high standard that she can't possibly live up to. I spent months imagining how perfect my life would be with her and lamenting the fact that I couldn't have her. I spent hours praying for some kind of miracle that would bring us full circle so we could find our way back together and I never once acknowledged that I visited every form of torture on HER that I could possibly visit. I made her fly in an airplane back to Seattle from Miami with a million and one unanswered questions that I wouldn't acknowledge. Then I forced her to watch me leave with Mark and then move in with him. And I invited her over as her 'friend' to let her see our picture over the mantle and our perfect storybook life ... but I expected her to not go forward with hers.

And somehow, for reasons I don't understand at all, God did let us come full circle and here we are.

We're happy. We're together. We're getting married.

So why in the blue blazes of HELL am I pissed at her for chasing happiness? I wouldn't let her chase me ... what else was she supposed to do?

"Fuck." I say, pushing my chair back. "I need to go find her."

"She just went into surgery," Addison tells me, shrugging her shoulders. "So, you'll have to suffer the way you've made her suffer."

I sit down again. "When did you and Erica become such good friends?"

"When I made the effort to get to know her. You'd be surprised at how much we bonded over that lump in her breast. I genuinely like her, Callie. And I love the way she loves you. As bad as you have it for her ... she's even worse over you. That day that I examined the lump ... she wasn't worried about herself. She sat there and cried because she was afraid she'd let you down by getting sick. She couldn't stand the thought of disappointing you."

If Addison is trying to make me cry ... it's working. She seems to realize that I'm falling apart because she hugs me, rubbing my back as I cling to her. "I hate being so damn stubborn," I admit. "And I hate my pride."

"Then fix it." She sits back and hands me a napkin. "Go home early and cook her dinner and ... fix it."

I nod at her, but before I can thank her for the advice, my pager goes off. Unfortunately, it's not a trauma. I'm being summoned to Gavin's office. He's got his feet propped on the desk and is thumbing through a motorcycle magazine when I pause in the doorway to glare at him. What self respecting man wears yellow Crocs with no socks? I really don't want to have to see his hairy ankles and I can't imagine that it's very sanitary, either. He doesn't acknowledge me other than to point at the chair across from his desk. "I'd rather stand," I tell him. "I'm leaving early, by the way. I have -"

"I was about to tell you that you definitely need to head out early to get some rest. Tomorrow is going to be a big day, Calliope. We will make or break a little girl and we have to keep that in mind. Everything we do during that surgery will impact Emma for the rest of her life." He flips a page in his magazine and glances up at me. "You're going to give me one hundred and sixty percent, right?"

"I think I can muster two hundred percent for this surgery." I give him a smile, but really ... it's not because of him. It's because I'm ready to repair my love life and when I wake up tomorrow ... I'll be in Erica's arms and that's always a great way to start the day. "So, I'm gonna go and -"

"Is it true that your ... fiancé ... is Erica Hahn?" He eyeballs me in a way that I'm not very fond of.

"Yes, it is."

His brows go up about two inches. "Wow. Everything I've always heard about Hahn ... none of it ever included her making time for a personal life."

"She manages just fine," I assure him. "Are we done now? I have some things I need to do and -"

"Yeah, sure." He pushes himself back and stands up, motioning toward the door.

I don't actually need an escort, but he seems intent on following me. He starts to ramble about taking a motorcycle ride to clear his head and I pause in front of the nurse's station to make sure that there are no cases that I need to work on before I leave. He keeps talking, babbling now, and I have no idea if there's a point he's trying to make. I cross my arms over my chest and lean back against the counter. "Do you always do this before a big surgery?" I ask.

"Do what?" he replies.

"Talk nonstop."

"Oh." He chuckles and rubs the back of his neck. "Yeah, I do."

"Great. I'll make sure that I keep my iPod handy tomorrow because your voice is like nails on a chalkboard."

"Speaking of tomorrow," he says, ignoring my barb, "I heard this rumor that you like to jam out in the operating room."

"Yeah and I'm not changing that for you. If you have a problem with music then I suggest you bring your own iPod."

"God, you really are quick to jump to conclusions aren't you, Calliope?"

"What's your middle name?" I ask. When he doesn't answer right away, I reach into his pocket and take his wallet, flipping it open and laughing at his driver's license photo. "Well, well, well. Apparently your mother was a music fan as well."

"Don't put your hand in my pocket unless it's an invitation," he growls, snatching his wallet from me. "And if you value your life at all ... do not call me that!"

"Say my name, bitch," I politely tell him. "Now."

"Callie. Okay? You're Callie. And if anyone here calls me by my middle name ... I'll ... I'll ... you don't want to know what I'll do. Because it will keep you up all night worrying." He turns on his heel and stalks away, hands on his hips.

"I'm shakin'!" I call after him. "Anyone with that name can't be scary, dude!"

"It's a good thing you're pretty, Torres, because you're diabolical," he says over his shoulder, still walking. "Now go away!"

I'm still laughing at him and his middle name when someone taps me on the shoulder. I turn around and the smile fades off my face instantly. Erica has obviously been sitting behind the desk at the nurse's station and I didn't see her. I recover fast and prop my elbows on the counter. "What time are you getting off, Yellow?"

Erica glances left, then right, leaning closer to me. "What the hell was that just now?"

"What was what?"

"Is this why you're so late every night? You need to hang around and flirt with him?"

"Flirt!?" I laugh at the absurdity of it. "Didn't you get the memo? We hate each other."

"Right." She takes a step back and snatches her chart off the desk. "Of course you do. I have work to do."

"Erica, wait."

She doesn't listen to me so I jog the length of the station and catch up with her in the hallway. When I put my hand on her arm, she stops walking and whirls around to face me. "What, Callie!?"

"I thought you were in surgery. Addison said -"

"I got bumped until tomorrow. There was a trauma downstairs." Her eyes move over my face. "Anything else?"

"What time is your shift over today?"

"Why?"

"Because you're right. We need to talk."

She swallows and I watch the muscles in her throat constrict. To my shock and horror, her chin trembles as she purses her lips together. "Fine," she finally says. "I'll be done here in a couple of hours."

The tightness in her voice is a dead giveaway that she's barely keeping her emotions in check, but before I can reassure her or tell her that I'm sorry for everything, she stalks into a patient's room. I wait ten minutes and finally give up. I'll just cook something fantastic and try to recreate the beautiful atmosphere she had going on last night.

We'll be fine.

I don't light the candles on the table until the security alarm beeps to let me know she's entered the code in at the gate. I'm sure there are more romantic meals than spaghetti, but I'm seriously handicapped in the kitchen and I do want her to be able to actually eat it. I pick up the sunflower bouquet I bought at the florist and walk into the living room, waiting for the door to open. She takes her sweet ass time and when she finally comes in she's looking at the floor. She's pulled her hair up into a messy ponytail and when she sniffles, I know that she's crying. I put the vase on the coffee table and reach out, taking her purse.

"So, I have this huge problem," I tell her, keeping it light. "I really need to talk to my best friend so can you be that person and let me talk to you?"

Erica smoothes her palms over her cheeks and nods at me. "You can talk to me about anything."

I point at the sofa and she sits down. I sit a few inches away from her and take a deep breath. "I have the biggest surgery of my career tomorrow and I can't concentrate on it."

"I heard about it today. I'll be in the gallery watching. It should be fascinating." She glances at me, then looks away fast. "Why can't you concentrate?"

"Because I'm pretty sure that I screwed up with my fiancé." I watch her face, but it remains impassive. "I knew that she had this insanely pretty ex-girlfriend, but I saw a video of them and ... well, it drove home that this other woman is everything I'm not. She's got a perfect body and she's young and ... beautiful. So, my insecurities came out and I started a huge fight because ... I'm terrified that my fiancé is going to compare me to her and see that I'm nothing like that and maybe she'll regret that she chose me. But I'm not mad anymore and I really don't know what to say to her to make her understand that."

Erica ponders my words for a while before she speaks. "I'm pretty sure that your fiancé thinks that you're the most beautiful woman she's ever seen. And ... she probably slept with that other woman because she was so different from you, but I'd be willing to bet she still saw you and wanted you the entire time she was with her. I'd be willing to bet she cried every time it was over because ... she couldn't make her be you ... no matter how she tried.

"And, Callie, I also think that seeing your reaction to that video hurt her as much as it hurt you. Because she has a tendency to feel everything right along with you because she loves you that much. As for regretting her choice ... how could a person regret the best decision of their life. I know your fiancé and I think she'd tell you that you're the only thing in the world that she loves more than her career. You're her life and anything that happened before you ... she doesn't care about and neither should you."

I reach out and squeeze her hand. "You're the best friend I've ever had."

"Well, I - I need to talk to you, too. About my love life."

"I'm all ears," I tell her.

"I'm in love with this amazing woman and I still have to pinch myself sometimes to believe that it's real," Erica says and she keeps a grip on my hand. "But I think maybe I'm failing when it comes to making sure she knows what she means to me. She is, without a doubt, the sexiest and most desirable woman I've ever seen. When I touch her I feel blessed and so lucky that she's given me that right. I'm doing something wrong, though, because she obviously doesn't know that I feel that way. I need to do something to make her realize what I feel for her so that she never doubts it again. What would you suggest?"

"You've put me in a very difficult position." I scoot to the edge of the sofa and pull my boots off, setting them aside. I slowly take out my earrings and then move my hands to the buttons on my shirt. "I mean, I am your best friend so I should just ... show you what I suggest and if you do this to her ... I'm pretty sure that it will erase all doubt that she has."

Erica watches me unbutton my shirt and licks her lips. "No ... I'm very faithful to her. You can't tempt me."

I slide my shirt off and reach for the clasp on the front of my bra. "Not even a little?"

Her lips part when I flip open the clasp and my breasts fall free. "Maybe a little."

I stand up and unbutton my pants and she doesn't move ... she simply watches every move I make. I take my panties down with my jeans and kick them aside. When I straddle her legs, she runs her hands over mine and rests them against my hips. I think she's going to tease my nipple, but she doesn't. Instead, she rests her forehead against my chest and I feel her shoulders shake as she starts to cry. "Erica -"

"I really am sorry," she tells me. "I never wanted to -"

"I know." I kiss the top of her head, then cup her face, forcing her to look up at me. "It's okay."

When I kiss her mouth, she moves her arms around my waist and pulls me flush against her, holding so tightly that it's almost uncomfortable. Almost, but not entirely. Our tongues touch, our lips move slowly and thoroughly, and my body starts to ache in all the places that hurt so good. I wedge my arm between us and start inching her shirt up, teasing patches of her skin as I pull the fabric upward.

"Wait," she whispers, her mouth against mine. "We really should talk about -"

"It's fine."

"I'm not fine," she snaps. "We need to establish a few things here."

I rest my hands on her shoulders, playing with the curly hairs on her neck. "I'll establish anything you want AFTER we make up for lost time."

"No, Callie."

I have to admit ... I'm stunned when she turns to the side and pushes me off her lap. I fall back on the sofa and sit up, watching her stumble to her feet and pace the length of the living room once. "What is your problem now!?" I demand.

"You!" she cries. "Sex is not the answer here!!"

"Then what is!?"

"Do you understand that you left me? You blew out of here and left me wondering if you were coming back! You slept in the other room, you refused to speak to me, you treated me like shit, and that's not acceptable!" She stops pacing and points her finger at me. "When you're in a relationship ... you can't do that! We've had this conversation before and you told me you wouldn't leave!"

"No, I told you I'd always come home ... which I did."

"Home ... is with me. In our bed. You may have been in the house, but you weren't home!" She puts her hands on her hips and I don't know why I do it ... but I roll my eyes. Wrong. Thing. To. Do. "Did you just - you know what? Fuck it! You don't want to take this seriously so neither do I. I'm going to take a shower and you can sleep in the god damned guest room again!"

"I don't want to sleep in there!"

"Fine! I'll sleep in there!"

"Erica, I am trying like HELL to apologize when I'm not even the one who should be apologizing and -"

She picks up her purse and leaves me standing there naked and stunned.

This certainly didn't go the way that I planned.

I go to the basement and find a clean pair of pajamas, then shower in the hallway bathroom. It has no water pressure to speak of so I rush through it and yank a brush through my wet hair before I head into the guest room. The unmade bed looks like a torture chamber to me. I sit down on the edge of it to towel the ends of my hair and I know that it's going to be a sleepless night for me. And I can't afford a sleepless night. I'm going to be holding a little girl's life in my hands tomorrow and I need to be rested when I do that.

My pride attempts to kick my ass as I stand up and walk across the hallway. I can't believe I knock on the door like a well trained child ... like a visitor. Erica calls out a terse, "What?!"

I push it open and step into our bedroom. She's eating a bowl of cereal as she sits propped against the headboard with the remote control in her lap. I glance at the television before I look back at her. "This surgery that I'm doing tomorrow will probably last well over twelve hours."

"So?"

"So ... the only time I sleep well is when I'm with you. Can I please stay in here?"

She holds her spoon in her mouth, glaring at me for a while before she answers. "Did you eat anything for dinner?"

"No."

"What did you have for lunch?"

"Twinkies."

"Do you want some cereal? We have the chocolate kind you like and -"

"I just want to go to sleep. Please?"

She nods at me and moves a book off my side of the bed. I walk into the bathroom and brush my teeth, trying to will myself not to cry. When I return to the bedroom she's not there and my heart sinks, but she comes back in before I can go and look for her. I pull the cover back and climb in, turning my back to her. I hear her sigh and feel the bed shift under her weight. She flips a few channels on the television and settles on the nightly news which is always enough to put us both to sleep. I listen to the weather report and try to unwind, but I feel like my insides are knotted in untidy little bows so I fail miserably.

She turns the television off after the news and I hear her put the remote on her bedside table. She checks the alarm on her phone and tugs at the cover, causing me to lift my arm so she can take what she needs. Apparently she views it as an invitation because she spoons against my back and slides her arm under mine, resting her palm between my breasts.

"You're going to do just fine tomorrow, Callie."

Her breath tickles my ear and I cover her hand with mine, lacing our fingers together. Her faith in me is like a deep tissue massage and the warmth of her body against my cold one feels like a lullaby. My eyes are sliding closed when she kisses my neck and whispers, "Welcome home, baby."

I roll over then and she opens her arms for me.

We don't make love.

But she makes the fear that is seizing my gut vanish.

And I sleep like a baby with my head on her shoulder and my arm holding her close.

Thank you all for the feedback on the last chapter. I have to confess ... that's why this chapter happened so quickly. I was inspired by YOU. :)

Please drop me a line. I love to interact with you all. :)


	29. Chapter 29

I have woken up to many different scenarios in my life. Some of them weren't that great. Senior year of college? I woke up butt naked with my face in the sand with a cop waiting nearby to write me a ticket. My father got me out of that little jam with quite a bit of money and never told my mother, which I need to thank him for again. My first year as an intern? I woke up when a fellow intern vomited in my hair because someone had vomited on her and she didn't quite make it to the shower. In Vegas, I woke up to George trying to develop a foot fetish because he felt that sucking his wife's toe was someone more sanitary than a random girl (which ended badly for him because I'm so ticklish). And by far and away ... the worst time I woke up was in the recovery room alone after the surgery to repair my hip and leg after the boating accident. I had no idea where I was or what had happened, but I was too weak to scream.

I am one hundred percent sure that I went to sleep in Erica's arms.

But I am alone in our bed and she is nowhere to be seen.

This? This may top them all as bad awakenings.

I am on my feet so fast that I tangle up in the cover and make quite a racket hitting the ground. Because it's only one of the most important days in my (and Emma Foster's) life, I also whack my head on the roll top desk that's against the wall and see stars for about twenty seconds. Ruma and Feo, who had been sleeping with me immediately take cover under the bed and I'm tempted to try to follow when the door is flung open and Erica flips the light on.

"Callie?"

"I'm okay."

I hear the patter of her slippers as she hurries around the bed. "Oh my god, baby! What happened?"

"Where were you?"

She pulls the cover from under my legs and extends her hand. "Well, you have to be at the hospital early so I thought I'd cook something. You know ... it's a big day for you and ... what did you hit your head on? You're bleeding."

"Great." I let her help me to my feet and squeeze my eyes closed, hoping the fuzziness fades. "Do me a favor?"

She nods at me, picking up a box of tissue and pressing one against my eyebrow. "What do you need?"

"I need for you to be here when I wake up."

I watch her jaw clench a little and her eyes narrow. This is not a good sign. Really. "How on earth did you manage when you chose to sleep in the guest room and on the sofa?"

"Erica -"

"You know, it amazes me that what you need always comes before what I need." She puts a little too much pressure on the tissue and I hiss, flinching away. She removes it and eyes the damage. "Are pancakes fine?"

"I don't want anything."

"You are going to be in surgery for hours. You need to go into with a full stomach and -"

"You obviously don't remember much about my needs or you'd remember that I skip breakfast on big surgery days. I'm too nervous to eat. I've only told you that a million times." Reaching up, I prod the small gash on my head and grit my teeth. This really is not how I want to start the morning. It will inevitably set the tone for the entire day and that's the last thing I need when I'm going to be holding someone else's life in my hands. Hell, how am I supposed to give a six year old the ability to laugh when I can't even laugh anymore. "I'm going to take a shower."

"Whatever."

She walks out and slams the door behind her. I listen to Ruma and Feo hiss and meow their aggravation at how their day has started as I pull fresh underwear from the drawer. Erica's are folded neatly next to mine. I always do the laundry. It's something domestic that I really can't fuck up ... and I always fold her underthings, but toss mine in all wadded up. Where a majority of hers are lacy, thanks to my shopping spree online where I bought every color of her famous blue panties, most of mine are cotton boy shorts, childish looking because of the prints, and boasting everything from Smurfs to the Muppets to Spiderman. I choose a pair of Cookie Monster ones because they're comfortable and usually pretty lucky, then stand under cold water and try to scrub the tension out of my body. It doesn't work, but I give myself an A for effort.

I dress in my scrubs at home because I really don't know if I'll be in any frame of mind to do it at the hospital. I'm not a first year intern, but I still get nervous when I have an elective surgery. I can breeze through traumas because I don't have time to sit and dwell on them. I don't get to know the patient because a majority of the time ... they're unconscious or so souped up on pain medication that they can't string sentences together. But when you have an elective surgery, one where you sit down and discuss why a certain procedure is the best thing for the patient, you have to interact for a while. I held Emma Foster in my arms. I felt the weight of her, I smelled her hair, I felt her breath on my neck and I gazed into her one brown eye and saw that she trusted me. When I said rib, she happily pulled up her shirt and let me see hers.

This is not a trauma.

This is a little girl who can live without me cutting her open.

And could die because I do.

My hands are shaking when I brush my teeth and I splash mouthwash all over my scrub shirt which makes me shout in frustration. It takes me five minutes to locate a clean one and another ten to remember that my lucky undershirt is still at work. I've basically emptied all the dresser drawers and can't get anything to fit properly. I finally give up and throw everything into the corner. I'll have to get to it later because the clock on the end table assures me that I took too long in the shower. I go back into the bathroom to braid my hair and put a Band Aid over my eyebrow before I scour the closet for my most comfortable Crocs ... and then take a pair of Erica's socks because I want her there. Anyway I can get her.

When I'm presentable, I go downstairs and head into the kitchen. Erica has her reading glasses on and I swear to GOD that there is nothing in the world sexier than watching her do a crossword puzzle and nibble on the tip of her pen while wearing THOSE glasses. They're perfect for her face, slightly square and not too big. She only ever wears them in the morning and I usually sit across the table and think of every perverted thing I have ever done or would like to do to her. She's wearing them to push me over the edge. I just know she is. Dirty fighter. Such a dirty fighter.

"I'm sorry that I snapped at you," I tell her, filling the coffee cup she set out for me. We painted cups for each other at a pottery place before we ever slept together. She claimed it was National Friendship Day so we spent hours together. We were bored and went into a pottery shop after eating too much dessert at a local seafood place. I painted sunflowers on her cup ... never realizing how much significance it would have one day and she painted Superhero logos on mine. Also significant. I opt to sit next to her now instead of across from her. "I think it's nerves. I've never been more nervous in my life. This little girl ... she's ... special."

Erica writes something on her crossword puzzle, not acknowledging that I spoke. Damn. She's evil.

"Anything good in the paper?" I ask.

She hands me the part she has already thumbed through without looking up.

And she doesn't speak either.

I try again. "Do you want to ride into work with me? I know it's early, but -"

"No. I don't."

"It would be nice if you -"

"Let me guess ... you need me?"

"Well, that's a given," I say, reaching across the table to cover her hand with mine. She doesn't pull away and that makes me feel infinitely better. "I really screwed things up last night when I tried to apologize to you. I really ... I meant it when I said I was sorry."

She slams her free hand, the one holding the pen, down on the table. She doesn't drop it ... she slaps it against the table so hard that the lid flies off. "You didn't apologize! You actually went out of your way to point out that you should not be apologizing at all! The bottom line is ... you got horny and decided to have sex instead of talking to me about the problems we're having! And you have made it very clear that you think I'm a whore ... but I'm a whore with her dignity still intact! I've given you everything else I have ... you're not taking that, too."

I nearly drop my cup and because it's so valuable to me I overcompensate and splash coffee over my hand. It's not scalding, but it is uncomfortable. I don't say anything as I get to my feet and pick up the paper towels. I clean the mess and put my cup in the sink while her words dance around in my head. It's all I can hear. It's all I can think about. I'd much rather cry on the way to work instead of in front of her because I don't want her to accuse me of trying to use my tears to win ... so I push my chair under the table and head out. She calls my name before I take more than a few steps and I stop walking.

I hear her chair scrape back and hold my breath, waiting for the next round. She puts her hand on my shoulder and I reach up, resting mine over hers. It's such a small, simple, casual gesture, but I never want to let go. I have to though, because she tugs free and wraps both arms around my waist and rests her chin on my shoulder instead. "I'd wish you good luck today, Callie, but you don't need it. You're going to do just fine."

"Thank you." My voice is trembling so much that I can barely understand myself, but she seems to have no problem.

"You're welcome."

We stand that way for as long as I can spare because even though I feel like time is standing still in her arms ... it's really not. The clock on the DVD player confirms this sad fact and I sigh, but it comes out like a shudder because the lump in my throat is refusing to let much air through. "I have to go."

She unwinds her arms, but catches my hand, turning me around. I can see on her face that she understands exactly how tenuous the grasp on my emotions really is and she cups my cheek. Wordlessly, she leans in and kisses the bandage on my head, then presses her lips against mine. "Drive safe."

"I will."

"I love you."

"I love you," I tell her and the battle is lost. I start to cry and it's the loud, ugly, horrible way that always makes my chest ache for days afterward. It's the same way I always cry when she's involved and as much as I hate it that it has to happen in front of her, I'm powerless to stop it. All I can do ... when she tries to pull me into her arms ... is shake my head no and sob out, "I'll see you at work."

She doesn't try to stop me.

But I can hear her own battle being lost behind me.

We really are in tune. Her sobs are just as loud as mine.

For fifteen miles I can barely see the road.

I make it to work on a wing and a prayer.

"What happened to your head?"

"Good morning to you too, Dr. Cole," I say, lifting the thick crude oil that the cafeteria claims is coffee to my mouth. I grimace at the bitterness that still remains after four sugars and add four more. He pulls out a chair and joins me, his eyes on mine. "Shouldn't you be scouring the supply closet for a scrub cap that won't ruin your hair?" I ask, uncomfortable with his scrutiny. "Take a picture. It'll last longer."

He crosses his arms over his chest. "You've been crying. Are you one of those women who fall apart before surgeries because I have to tell you ... I don't do women freak outs, listen to crying, or tolerate prayer in my operating room so if you've gotten that out of the way already ... thank you."

"You really love to listen to yourself talk, don't you?"

"Yes. I was blessed with quite a voice."

"That's a matter of opinion. Some people claim that Miley Cyrus has a voice, too. And she sounds like two cats fighting over a tuna flavored rat."

He grins now and lowers his arms. I watch the tension drain from his shoulders as he picks up his own cup. "The things you say," he tells me. "I don't know if it's amusing or if I should be concerned for your sanity."

"I never had a problem with my sanity until you showed up."

"Simmons disagreed with that assessment." He kicks out the chair beside mine and props his feet on it. "He said you lived in a world of confusion and made impulse decisions on a regular basis."

"Well, considering that he lived in a world of body odor and wouldn't know a decision if it bit him on the ass ... I'm not too insulted." I take another sip of coffee and give up. Nothing will help it and I can't force myself to drink it. Four tiny sips and my lips are trying to pucker up like I've had a mouthful of unsweetened lemonade. "Why don't you forget anything Simmons told you and draw your own conclusions."

"Oh, I am."

"And?"

"I think you live in a world of confusion and make impulse decisions. Did you really elope in Vegas with that little ... half grown man who looks like he could be an original Muppet?"

"My personal life, regardless of how intriguing it may be to someone who doesn't have one ... like yourself ... is off limits. I mean it."

He crosses his ankles and once again ... he's wearing Crocs, lime green now, with no socks. I stare at his ankles for a second and when I look back at him, he's grinning. "I just can't see it," he tells me.

"See what?"

"The kid's name is O'Malley, right? Your ex-husband?"

"What did I just tell you? Off limits!"

"I've only seen Dr. Hahn from afar, but her picture is always in the magazines with her articles. She's been published more times than me which I can commend. She's pretty, she's accomplished, she's driven and busts her ass to make a difference in medicine. I can see why you'd be attracted to her. But O'Malley? Hell, I guess he'd turn Elizabeth Taylor gay and she's proven repeatedly that she likes men."

I massage my forehead because he's giving me a migraine. "Gavin, people like you are the reason that people like me go to jail for assault and battery."

"Ahh, you called me Gavin. We're making strides in our friendship." He takes my coffee and sips it. He doesn't grimace at all. "Now, do you want to go a step further and tell me what's wrong? Let me guess ... you stumbled across photos of yourself in Vegas with Beaker and took a humiliating walk down memory lane?"

Why did he have to take my coffee? I don't think anything in the world would lift my spirits more than splashing it in his face, but he's got an iron fisted grip on it as if he can read my thoughts. I wish we had real cutlery in the cafeteria instead of plastic ones ... because I'd cut off the top of his spiky hair and poke his eyes out with the damn ends. "Ryan Seacrest called, he wants his flat iron back."

He drains the coffee flavored mud and crumples the cup. I'd like to shove that up his ass when he belches. He starts talking like he didn't just sound like a gunshot in a quiet room. "If we're not going to talk about you then we'll concentrate on the Foster case. I got the molds back for Emma's bottom jaw. I haven't shaped the wiring down yet ... I figured you could do after you take her ribs. I also got a call from her mother earlier. Emma apparently doesn't do well when separated from her parents and I don't want her facial muscles to tense up before we put her under. So ... do something to get her to listen to you. I suppose that what you lack in adult skills ... you make up for with children. They liked the way you interacted with her."

"Well, since you have no bedside manner to speak of ... I figured I'd have to step my game up a notch."

"I enjoy this back and forth exchange of insults we have going on, but I know that you have a deep rooted admiration for me. I know that you're thrilled to work with me and you appreciate my contributions to orthopedics."

"And what, pray tell, would give you such a false sense of -"

"Professor Rosenberg sent me your dissertation. I had ... was it ... seventeen footnotes? It read like a fucking fangirl gushing over my many accomplishments." The smile that spreads across his face is smarmy. There's no other word for it. "I think you called me the 'quintessential practitioner of surgery who will revolutionize the face of orthopedics in ways that people only dreamed of'."

Fucker. He must have read it a million times to stroke his own over bloated ego. "You must have misread it. I called you the 'quintessential practitioner of dumbass who will revolutionize grunge in ways people hoped would die with Kurt Cobain'."

"If that's the best verbal sparring you have then I'll let you get back to ... worshipping me in silence."

"In your dreams."

"In yours." He gets to his feet and stretches. "I'll see you in the O.R. in an hour an a half. I hope you're ready to impress me, Calliope."

"Oh, I do impressive without even trying, Elvis. Should I wear my 'Blue Suede Shoes' just for you?"

He drops the wadded cup in the floor. "What did I tell you about using my middle name!?"

"The same thing I told you about using my first."

"We're going to have a very interesting day, Calliope."

"Oh, 'Don't Be Cruel' just because you're 'All Shook Up', 'Hound Dog'." I tell him in a goading, sing song voice.

"I'm leaving now!"

"Awww, 'I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry'," I call after him. "I better book a room at the 'Heartbreak Hotel'."

He flips me a bird over his shoulder and I laugh.

Gavin Elvis Cole has met his match.

And I will be the one to revolutionize the face of orthopedics.

Starting with Emma Foster's.

No matter how much training a doctor receives or how much they witness, we start to circle like buzzards when anything new and exciting comes into the hospital. It's human nature to want to see people at their worst and Emma Foster is definitely the worst case of Treacher Collins that has ever been treated. She's one for the medical books and every doctor, nurse, intern and orderly has found a reason to stand outside her doorway. I have to clear my throat and physically move Cristina out of the way as I try to get through the throng of people. I'm shocked and a little horrified to see that the attendings and Chief Webber have also decided to converge in the hopes of glimpsing my patient. I try to make as much eye contact as I can to convey the fact that I'm about to run through the crowd like an angry bull when Erica appears and tells everyone to go to work. She uses a tone that makes people look guilty, especially Webber.

I'm almost trampled to death in the melee when people scatter like roaches and I want to offer Erica a thank you, but I can't look at her. I know that she'll have the same reddish colored rings around her eyes that I spent twenty minutes trying to cover with concealer under mine and the waterworks may start again. For both of us. I really don't know how in the hell we got to this place when everything seemed to be perfect in Italy and Nebraska. We spent hours talking about our relationship and going over what motivated us to handle things the way we did along the way. Instead of being at each other's throats and trying to choke each other with cruelty ... we should be happy as hell that we weathered the storm that took us to that point.

I'm frustrated when I see that Erica has decided to lean against the nurse's station with Mark, Addison, Derek, and Webber. Apparently they don't have work to do at all. I'm saved from biting their heads off by the arrival of Elvis. He's carrying Emma's chart and my eyes widen when I see that Yang is trailing behind him with her head down. She has the audacity to attempt a look of shame when she meets my eyes. "You have got to be kidding me," I say. "Yang!"

"We need another set of hands and hers are excellent," Gavin says, engrossed in the chart. He flips it shut a second later and nods at me. "We're ready. And you remember what I said. Keep her calm. I don't want her to be upset leading to the surgery. I mean it."

"No pressure or anything," I snap.

"If you're feeling performance anxiety tell me now so I can replace you." He raises a brow.

"The only thing I feel is bile rising in the back of my throat, but that's my body's natural reaction to you so I must be fine." I hear Mark and Derek laugh and Webber clear his throat, but I don't acknowledge it. Instead, I take a deep breath and turn to walk into Emma's room. The door opens as I reach for it and the little girl appears, gazing out into the hallway with her head tilted so her good eye can see everyone.

In my periphery, I see Mark's hand go to his chin the way it always does when he's at a loss. Shepherd looks away like he can't bare to look at Emma and Erica's mouth drops open a little. Just enough. Doctors are drawn to anything challenging but we all react like human beings. It hurts to look at Emma. It's disorienting and painful and hard to do. I turn my attention back to her and she waves at me. Her swollen tongue moves like she's trying to say something and she holds up a stuffed elephant that I recognize as Dumbo from the Disney movie. I squat down so that I'm eye level with her and say, "Did you bring a friend for your big day?"

She nods and rushes forward, holding out the elephant so I can take it. I make a great show of examining every detail, commenting about his ears, his trunk, even the yellow hat on his head. She makes the same wheezing, gasping sound of tragic non laughter from before when I hold the elephant up to my nose, facing her, and make an elephant sound. She holds out her arms to me and hugs me when I pick her up. Clinging to me, she rests her head on my shoulder and I feel her tongue against my neck as she ignores the looks that everyone is giving her. I pat her on the back and she pats mine. "Emma?" I ask softly. "Are you going to let me listen to your heart again?"

She leans back, nodding at me. There's a rope of saliva sliding down her chin and I brush it away with her shirt and tweak her nose which causes her to wheeze again. She grabs mine, still 'laughing'. Her slender shoulders shake as she pulls up her pajama shirt and points at her chest. With her free hand, she takes the end of Gavin's stethoscope and tugs, resting it against her skin. He takes advantage of the invitation and listens to her heart, then her lungs. She lets him check the pulse in her wrist with no fuss and leans her head against my shoulder again.

I can feel how warm she is through her princess pajamas. She's vibrant, full of life, and doesn't understand that I'm about to take her away from her parents. Her hair smells like baby powder and her breath is a little sour, but it's not unpleasant. She rubs a hand over my braid and points at her own hair, tugging at it. "You want braids?" I ask her.

She nods her head and another stream of saliva falls from her mouth. I wipe it away again and say, "Are you a big girl?"

Emma holds up six fingers and her brown eye is accusing now. How dare I ask such an obvious question? I pretend to bite her finger and she she wheezes again. "Big girls get to see a special room at the hospital," I say. "Do you want to see that room?"

She nods again and slowly lowers her hands.

"If you come and see that room with me, I promise I'll braid your hair later. Can you do that for me?"

The accusation leaves her eye and she glances behind us at her parents, motioning for them to follow us. Her mother shakes her head and says, "Mommy and Daddy aren't allowed, honey. You can go with Dr. Torres, though. You want to go see it with her?"

Emma takes her time as she ponders the question. She scratches the side of her head and searches her father's face while he smiles encouragingly at her. I feel her grip tighten on the back of my neck and watch her tuck her stuffed animal up under her arm like it can protect her or give her the answer. "Emma?"

She looks back at me, tongue lolling, eye wide. She's on the verge of tears and I know it.

"Will you please come with me?" I pat her on the belly, swaying a little to comfort her. "I won't leave you. I'll stay right with you and as soon as we're finished, your mom and dad can come. We'll have fun. I promise."

Her hand moves back to her hair and she worries it the same way Jasper does. She twirls it around her bony fingers as she weighs her options. I wonder if part of her knows what we're trying to do. She's had numerous surgeries already. I wonder if she's remembering the pain of recovery. I lift her elephant and say, "I'll make you a deal ... Dumbo can come with us and I happen to be friends with him so I bet I can make him talk to you."

She shakes her head and makes that choking, sputtering sound of glee.

"Oh, yes I can! But he's bashful. He won't talk to you out here. He has to talk to you in the other room."

Emma rubs the elephant's tightly stitched line that is supposed to be Dumbo's mouth, digging her fingernail into it to see if it will open. I think she understands that it is sewn too tightly ... the same way that her own mouth has been loosely stitched ... but she still nods at me and waves at her parents. Her mother bites her bottom lip, eyes moist with tears. She quickly gives her daughter a kiss and assures her that she'll see her soon ... then disappears into their private room. Her father does the same, lingering over her, breathing her in, then he pats me on the arm.

"She'll go to ... b.e.d ... easier if someone sings to her. We ... we always do." His voice breaks like waves in a hurricane and he kisses her again. "I'll see you later, Emmy Bug."

When he goes into the room after his wife, she leans out a little, looking after them. The door shuts and she points at it, then at herself. I take a deep breath and tuck her hair behind her ear. I ignore the question she just asked me and smile at her. "Do you want two braids or one?" I ask, trying to keep her calm.

Her back stiffens and she pushes at my chest, reaching for the door. Erica appears all of the sudden and holds up a colorful sticker. "Hi, Emma, look what I found. It's an elephant just like yours."

Emma stops thrashing and gazes at Erica with interest. She watches as Erica peels the large, round sticker off the white paper and points at the front of her shirt. Erica sticks it against her pajamas and smoothes it down, then smiles at her. "Well, you look beautiful now."

Holding up her elephant, Emma points at her new sticker, then at the elephant.

"You want one for Dumbo?" Erica asks.

Emma nods and then Mark descends upon us like a hero, unrolling an endless ream of stickers until Emma finds a clown and points at it. He sticks it to the elephant's back and she carefully presses her hand against it, rubbing out the wrinkles. She uses sign language to say thank you and then her head goes back to my shoulder and she hugs her elephant against her chest. It's time to go.

I give Erica a small, grateful smile and she returns it.

The crowd that was waiting outside Emma's room has taken up all the available space around the elevator. Emma squirms uncomfortably in my arms and hides her face against my neck, clutching at me. No one likes to be stared at. These people are forgetting that she's not in a cage, she's not on display, she's got a heart and feelings and doesn't understand why there's so much interest in her. Emma doesn't KNOW that she's different until people force her to feel that way. I hear Erica's voice again, telling everyone that she will personally blacklist them on surgeries as I step into the elevator. I don't turn around to watch the roaches scatter ... I close my eyes and pray the entire way to the surgical wing.

Getting Emma to let me have her pajamas proves to be almost impossible. Her parents made it clear that the arrival of a hospital gown would alert her to the fact that something major is about to go down. I finally play a game of hide and seek with her, where I hide my face behind every article of clothing I take from her and she's finally down to her underwear and shivering. She allows Cristina to hold her while I scrub in, but she keeps her eye on me as I cover my hair and scrubs in surgical wear. There's something in her eye when I look back at her and I know that she knows. The special room is actually an operating room and there's really no joy for her there. Cristina carries her into the O.R. and sets her on the bed while I get my gloves on. Emma tries to scramble off the second Cristina puts her down, but I catch her. I'll have to scrub in again because she latches onto me, ripping my gown, taking off my scrub cap in her haste. The wetness I feel against my neck this time is not her tongue. She's crying. She's crying and she can't make a sound with it.

Just like Jasper.

Her pain stays silent, but big, fat tears roll down her cheeks. Even her bad eye produces enough tears to break my heart. She leans back in my arms and points at the bed, shaking her head. The anesthesiologist catches my eye, holding up a syringe that I know contains medication that will calm her down. The second he gets near us, however, Emma starts to kick and wheeze and make sputtering sounds as she vehemently flails her arms to keep him at bay. I move to the corner, away from the chaos in the room and rub circles on her back, humming softly. I can see that the gallery is standing room only and it adds to the nervous tension that's beginning to spread from my neck to my back.

If anyone ever makes a comment about what I'm forced to do here ... I'll kill them a million times. And then go after their families.

Sometimes you have to sacrifice yourself on the altar of humiliation that is so severe that you'd welcome a blade to the gut. Sometimes ... you have to do things that you would rather slit your wrist to avoid because it's the right thing to do and there's nothing else that can save you.

When the humming turns to a song that I know she's familiar with ... she stops fighting altogether.

I've seen 'Dumbo' enough times to memorize every scene. I love that movie with the same passion that Jasper reserves for 'The Wizard of Oz'. And I sing 'Baby Mine' just loud enough for her to hear it, but the acoustics in the gallery are top notch and I cringe when all activity stops behind us. Everyone is listening.

I fucking hate the world.

"Baby mine, don't you cry. Baby mine, dry your eyes. Rest your head close to my heart ... never to part, baby of mine," I sing. "Little one when you play don't you mind what you say, let those eyes sparkle and shine, never a tear, baby of mine. If they knew sweet little you they'd end up loving you too."

The anesthesiologist never made a sound when he injected the medicine into her IV after the second line.

And she's asleep in my arms before I have to finish.

Thank God for little miracles.

At the four hour mark, I have carefully extracted two ribs. Talking has been minimal. Dr. Cole asks me several questions about the procedure as we go along, quizzing me, but never stumping me. When I take the two ribs to a nearby table to whittle them down to size, Cole begins to question Cristina. She has ready answers as well and I tune them all out as I carefully sand and measure every curve, every plane, and every edge of the ribs, comparing them to the mold that was created based on Emma's impression and x-rays. It takes me three hours to get them precise and insert the wiring that will be screwed into the base of what little there is of Emma's zygomatic bone. I also painstakingly sculpt the flat, mesh covered rib fragments that will become her ramus on either side.

At the nine hour mark, I have successfully removed the mold from the fake Emma head and put my own in place. I test it from every angle to make sure I'm not missing anything and then I submerge her new bottom jaw in sterile solution to let it set. I take a much needed break to suck down a cup of water, which my gurgling stomach is grateful for, and then I roll my head around to work out the kinks. When I return to the operating room, I'm pleased to hear music blaring and pop my knuckles in anticipation. Dr. Cole sees that I have returned and nods for me to join him a the operating table.

When I get there, I can tell that he has made all the necessary incisions and has carefully maintained the integrity of the many vital nerves and muscles. I stand to his left and watch him make one final incision, then he motions for the jaw I worked so hard on. I eagerly await his accolades for my fine job, but instead, he says, "Dr. Torres, why did you deviate from the plan?"

"Excuse me?"

"The front of the mandible was supposed to be wire."

"A dentist can't screw teeth into wire, Dr. Cole," I reply. "Our goal today is to give her the ability to eat real food. You can't eat pizza with no bottom teeth."

"Hmm." He holds the jaw up, gazing at it under the stark, overhead lights. "That's ... well ... that's ingenious is what that is."

"Thank you." I tell him and I'm smiling so hard behind my mask that it hurts.

He keeps the jaw under the light for just a second longer, examining it from every angle, then holds it out to me. "Go ahead."

"What?" I ask, smile fading.

"You built it, Callie," he say, stepping back so that I can take his spot. "Now ... finish it."

Holy shit.

I hear a low murmur from my co-workers and my eyes meet Cristina's over the operating table. She nods at me and I step to the left, into the driver's seat. Dr. Cole moves behind me and I'm aware that he's watching over my shoulder as I gently work the jaw into place. I painstakingly settle it into the correct position and wiggle it around slightly. "Cristina, please remove the clamps."

She takes out the many clamps and I push Emma's jaw up and down, making sure it looks right, that it feels right, before I begin securing it. I can already see a major difference in the angle of her face. Pleased with my handiwork, I open her mouth again and feel around, making sure I will have enough skin to cover the thickness of the front mandible bone that Cole had not planned for. I'm in luck. It will be a tight fit and one that we will have to carefully monitor, but I am able to pull the flaps of skin into place. Satisfied, I begin the slow, tedious process of drilling her face together. For her, it will probably feel like something foreign has been attached to her head and she will likely try to pull it out, but for me ... if all goes well ... it will feel like something native that God accidentally forgot to give her.

I don't know how much time passes, but I am aware that handling tool after tool is causing a steady ache in my arm. I'm aware that the equipment is making the room so unbearably hot that sweat is sliding down my back, between by breasts, and into the creases of my legs. The nurse keeps bathing my forehead and offering me water, but I'm in the zone. Using the tiniest screws imaginable takes something akin to fitting a camel through the eye of a needle and even though I'm shaking inside, my hands never falter once. I drown out the blaring music. I don't hear Emma's heart monitor. I don't even notice that I'm breathing at all as I eventually put the last stitch into what will become her bottom lip and tie it off.

She doesn't look like the same little girl.

Even though her tongue still protrudes slightly, she's got a face.

She's definitely got a face.

Cristina starts clapping first and it brings me out of the zone. Actually, it scares the shit out of me and I feel my heart thunder in response. I set aside my suturing kit and take a deep breath. All around me people are giving high fives and singing a chorus of 'good job' and 'we did it'. I turn around and look at Dr. Cole and he nods at me. I offer my hand because a hand shake seems to be in order, but the only thing he shakes is his head. When he pulls me into his arms and lifts me off my feet ... I'm too tired to punch him. I let him hug me and I hug him back.

"Good job, Calliope."

"Thanks, Elvis."

"I'd tell you to call me 'The King', but this is really your moment."

"You're right. It is."

He sets me on my feet and pats me on the shoulder. "You did warn me that you were amazing."

"I never lie."

Elvis and I speak to the Fosters together. I guess he realizes that I'm dead on my feet because he does most of the talking and I'm grateful for that. I accept the hugs and the outpouring of gratitude, then tell them I want to be with Emma when she wakes up. The little girl is still in recovery when I go in and Cristina is sitting beside her, smoothing her hand through her hair. When she realizes that I'm watching, she quickly drops her hand and says, "What? It was matted."

"Mmm hmmm." I move to the other side of the stretcher and watch the little girl wake up slowly. She's dazed and out of sorts, reaching aimlessly into the air the same way that Jasper does when he chases dolphins on the ceiling. "Hi, Emma."

I have to stop her when she tries to sit up, but I don't stop her from groping over her new face. She's been bandaged enough to hold her new jaw firmly in place, not letting her move it. She can't do any damage to herself and she's not trying to. She's carefully exploring the gauze, letting her fingers dance over it gracefully. She signs with her hand and I don't know what she's saying. Jasper was learning sign language for a while, before he was injured, and I learned a few basics with him, but I have no clue what she wants now.

Cristina clears her throat. "She's asking what happened." I must look startled because Yang qualifies her knowledge by saying, "My step father was deaf. My mother and I learned to sign for him."

Emma signs again and I say, "Emma, you're okay. You had an operation. You know what that is, right?"

She nods and points at her blinded eye.

"No," Cristina tells her. "We didn't operate on your eye."

Emma's arms cross over her chest and her brow furrows. She's pouting. She wanted us to fix her eye. She wanted to see out of her eye. I don't know if there is anything more heartbreaking in the world than failing to fix everything. I rub her arm and point at my face. "We operated on your jaw."

She reaches out and touches my jaw, then touches her own. It's wrapped so tightly she probably doesn't notice a difference yet. She spells out 'hurt' with her hand, which I can read. I pick up the syringe and give her a little pain medication and watch her eye flutter shut. It opens again a moment later and she points at me. The frown line is back on her face and she signs quickly.

"Oh, man." Cristina shakes her head, rising to her feet. "I'm out."

"What is she saying?" I ask. I didn't realize that she was so ... fluent ... with her hands. She didn't do that when I met her the first time.

"Nothing," Cristina assures me.

Emma hits the bed, hard, with her fist.

"YANG! TELL ME!" I demand.

Cristina looks at the little girl, then back at me. "She said that you're a liar. She said that there was no special room and," she glances back at Emma, who is tugging at her hair. "and you didn't braid her hair so you're not her friend."

So, I only thought that I had a broken heart before this moment.

Erica? Apparently she's cracked it a couple of times, but Emma Foster snaps it down the middle.

"I'm sorry." I let the rail down on Emma's bed and sit beside her. Her Dumbo has been wrapped in plastic and is sitting on the table so I quickly tear into it and hold it out to her. She takes it, letting it rest on her chest. "I didn't mean to lie to you. But I didn't want you to be upset. And I will braid your hair just as soon as you feel better."

Her little hand flies again and I look at Cristina, who grits her teeth. "She said that when you promise someone something you have to tell the truth."

Even though Cole would probably shoot me for moving her, I lift Emma into my arms. She comes willingly and puts her head on my shoulder. The back of her hair is tangled so I have to rake through it with my fingers to separate it into three parts, but I put a braid there. It's messy and not tight, but I take the elastic band out of my own hair to hold it in place. She's sound asleep when I put her back in the bed and Cristina helps me cover her up.

"That was pretty nice, Callie," Yang says. "Almost as nice as your singing and -"

"I will snap your neck like a twig, Cristina. Never mention that again."

"Who knew my one time roommate was a rock star?"

"I'm not even kidding. Death. Death will come knocking if you don't shut up."

"Awww, you even have the temperament of a singer. You diva."

"Zip it."

"Why did you braid her hair?" Cristina asks. "It's not going to stay and it's probably not comfortable."

"Because she's right. When you promise someone something ... you have to tell the truth."

And I was also right when I thought that Emma Foster would probably teach me a lesson.

She has.

She has also screwed a light bulb over my head and it's a megawatt dawning of realization on my part.

I have to find Erica.

Now.

Even though every form of communication is available to me, I still make an ass of myself by running all over the hospital. I ask a million people if they've seen Erica and it never crosses my mind to just call her. It's almost ten p.m. and the twelve hour surgery we anticipated was really closer to thirteen, but I don't think Erica went home. She wouldn't leave me to drive myself because she's the kind of person who thinks about things like that. I know she's somewhere in the hospital and I waste thirty minutes riding elevators up and down as I search for her. In desperation, I head up to the roof because she once told me that the view at night was spectacular and sure enough, she's standing at the railing with Addison.

They are dressed in their street clothes and I'm still in my scrubs, but none of that matters. It also doesn't matter that my braid has come completely undone and the cool September wind is whipping it around my head like tentacles. All that matters is that I get it. I completely understand. Addison sees me coming and meets me halfway, hugging me. I listen to her congratulate me, but my eyes never leave Erica. The wind is also doing something with her hair and it takes my breath away. I feel like I'm seeing her for the first time, but this time ... I know exactly what role I want her to play in my life. Sure, she's always going to be my best friend, but I want her to be everything else, too. I want her in the good times, the bad times, and for all time.

"You should get some rest," Addison tells me. She steps around me, blocking Erica from my view and making me look at her instead. "She's not in a very good mood. Don't push her buttons tonight, Callie, because she's not going to deal with that very well."

"What happened?" I ask.

"She'll tell you. Just ... proceed with caution." Addison gives me a stern look. "Do you get what I'm saying?"

"Yeah. I get it."

Addy gives me a quick hug and adds, "You were incredible in that surgery. I was proud of you."

I give her a smile. "Thanks."

Addison leaves us alone and I attempt to run my hands through my hair to tame it, but only succeed in getting my engagement ring stuck. I can't free it. I'm scalping myself by trying. So, when I join Erica at the railing, I look like a complete idiot, but try to pretend that I don't notice that my elbow is right beside my left eye. "Hey," I say casually. "I'm glad you're still here."

"You did a good job today," she tells me, staring out at the Space Needle. "That was smart, using the bone at the front of the mandible that way. It never would have crossed my mind."

"You're a heart doctor. I wouldn't be able to do a running whip stitch if my life depended on it."

She smiles now and glances at me. Then she frowns. "What the hell are you doing?"

"I'm stuck," I tell her, mortified. "My ring is not coming out of my hair."

"Oh for heaven's sake." She attempts to help me out, but the forces of nature are against us. The wind is practically howling now and a light drizzling of rain starts to fall. "Let's go inside."

She leads me toward the door with a hand on my back and the presence of it against me acts like a pain pill. I'm calm and the aching in my body is effectively dulled. I wish everyone in the world could have that one person whose mere presence, whose touch ... is all you ever need to survive. Inside the stairwell, she tells me to sit down and stands behind me, carefully coaxing my hair out of the diamond. When it's finally loose, I examine my ring, making sure it's not damaged. I'm pleased to note that the prongs that hold the diamond in place are just fine, though enough hair is caught underneath to make a wig. She sits down beside me as I attempt to pluck the hairball free.

I'm still working on it when she puts her arm around me and rests her head on my shoulder. "Callie ... I need to talk to you."

I think I lose control of my body in that moment. She makes it sound like the end of the world. My brain moves fast. She was on the roof with Addison. She's having a bad day. She's in a bad mood. How does that fit. "Oh my god! You don't - Addison didn't tell you that you have breast cancer, did she? You're not -"

"What? No!" She sits up and looks at me in shock. "Where do you come up with this stuff?"

"I don't know. You were talking to Addison and -"

"I got a phone call today."

"Oh?"

"From a man who claims to be my father." Her blue eyes are so big in her pale face that I feel like I'm drowning in them. "He - he found that note you left at the cemetery and he knew my birthday. He wants to come to Seattle for that."

"Oh my god!" I clasp her hand in mine and she's shaking. "This ... this is .. great! This is amazing. Right?"

"I don't know," she replies. "I ... I just don't know."

"Erica, if he is your father then -"

"Then he left me with my aunt and uncle and never tried to find me. He ... left me."

It's my turn to put my arm around her and I hold her as close as I possibly can without pulling her into my lap. I'd like for her to be in my lap, but I'd probably drop her because my body is starting to howl in pain again. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry that he left and ... well, I'm sorry that I did, too."

"All your clothes are in the floor at home," she says. "Are you planning on going somewhere?"

"What? No! I ... I was looking for a clean shirt and I was too lazy to put it all back." I watch her profile. She doesn't believe me. "I know this is probably the worst timing possible because you've got your mind on your dad and -"

"My mind is on you. It's always on you." She rubs her finger over a loose thread in the seam of her pants. "I want us to be the way we were and it doesn't feel like we ever -"

"Look at me," I tell her and wait patiently for her to comply. "I need - no - you need to hear me out. I did a lot of thinking when I was standing there in surgery today and I finally caught up with you, I think. I've been so wrapped up in my point of view that I haven't really taken time to see yours. I see it now, Yellow."

"You do?"

"Yeah." I nod at her. "I do. You and me ... we have our own special issues. My biggest issue is that I'm insecure as hell. I never feel good enough or pretty enough or thin enough. I think about your life with Rachel and how she was your first in so much. And I think about Helen and how she's everything I'm not and I don't think I can ever measure up so -"

"I never -"

"I know," I cut her off. "Listen to me. The only time I ever feel perfect is when I'm in your arms and you chase away any doubt that I have. I trust you and you go out of your way to make me believe in you and us. You have never, ever, given me any reason to doubt myself or what we have. You love me and I know that every second of the day."

I reach out and touch her hair, her cheek. "But I don't do that for you. Your biggest issue is fear of abandonment and you earned the right to have it because I keep failing. I promised you something in Miami and then left you. I cut you out of my life after you gave it to me to begin with. I wasn't alive at all until you ... and I repaid you by leaving you. And you let me back in, Erica ... and I did it again. That day in the cab, when we were fighting, I left you. I stayed gone overnight and -"

"I pushed you and -"

"Let me finish. Please?" I turn a little on the stair so I can face her. "I promised you I would always come home after that, but at the first sign of trouble ... I ran again. I abandoned you. It doesn't matter that I came back ... all that matters is that I left to begin with and made you doubt me. Again."

"It's -"

"I asked you to marry me. And like always ... when I ask you for something ... you say yes." I rub a tear off my cheek and take both of her hands in mine. "And I want to give you as much as you give me. I've given you my heart, my body, my soul ... but ... every time I give you my word ... I snatch it back. I never really understood how important it is to give your word and mean it. I do now. So ... I'm telling you, I'm promising you, I swear to God ... I will never leave again unless you tell me to."

"That will never -"

"Or ... keep interrupting me." I smile because he does. "Erica, we're getting married. I don't know when or where ... but we're going to stand up in front of people and speak vows. I want you to be able to believe everything I say to you then ... and now. I'm sorry. I'm apologizing with my clothes on and with everything I have. I don't have a right to ask because -"

"Yes, Callie, I forgive you." She inches a little closer to me, kissing me softly. "And I believe you."

Hugging her is probably the only thing that feels better than kissing her. Or making love with her. Or ... well, it's in the top five things to do with her. We fit together like puzzle pieces. Sitting, standing, leaning, lying side by side ... we fit. It's a comfortable and comforting kind of match that takes you home ... wherever you are. She feels good and even though she's holding me so tightly that I can barely breathe, she's more soothing than constraining. I could sit on these cold, hard steps for hours if it meant we were together this way.

"I'll let you sleep in our bed on three conditions," she tells me.

"Three!?"

"Yep." She sits back, still holding my hands. "Number one, you have to take a shower because you smell like you've been operating for hours."

"That bad, huh?"

"You also smell a little like men's aftershave which brings me to number two. The next time Gavin Cole hugs you ... if you don't donkey kick his balls ... I'm kicking your ass."

"Ouch. What's number three?"

"That song you sang to Emma," she says and I swear she gives me a look that I've never seen before. "You have to sing it to our kids. All the time."

I grin so big my face hurts. "I'm pretty sure I can do all of the above."

"And, Callie?"

"Yeah?"

She gets to her feet and pulls me to mine. "Eat something. I don't care if it's got so much trans fat that I can hear your arteries clogging ... just eat."

"You want to buy me dinner?"

"It's late."

I beam at her. "I know this great place that's open twenty four hours. And I'm pretty sure you get clogged arteries just walking in because there's so much grease everywhere. There's a loud jukebox, an even louder waitress whose dentures flop around, and the cook looks like he may be an escaped murderer. There's ambiance like you have never experienced before."

"I can't wait."

Something amazing happens when we walk into the diner. Mark and Addison have arrived not long before us by the looks of things. They're just placing their order and Mark sees us, waving us over. The waitress, the one with the floppy dentures, gives me a hug and tells me how good it is to see me. She frets over weight loss that I really didn't notice in myself and greets Erica warmly, like an old friend even though they've never met. All the tables are full and I start to suggest that we sit at the bar when Mark clears his throat and gestures at the empty half of the booth. It's as close to an invitation as we're going to get and I glance at Erica, who nods and slides in, sitting across from Addison.

I sit across from Mark and we lock eyes. This was our place. This was our special place and our special food and now we're sharing it with someone else. He looks away when the waitress brings our drinks and slides his arm around Addison's shoulders. She leans into him, giving him a tender smile before she pores over the menu again. She's just like Erica. They're both gazing at the one page of choices like it's written in French. They talk back and forth to each other, speculating on what the 'secret sauce' could be or what exactly a 'Road Kill Sandwich' is.

Mark and I both order Sunrise Waffles and share a secretive smile.

Really ... it's not sad that there are two new people at the table or that we've moved so far beyond who we were as a couple. As I slide my fingers through Erica's and Mark threads his own through Addison's red hair I realize that moving on doesn't mean you can never go back.

Mark is my friend again.

And maybe there's a part of him that can be Erica's friend, too.

After the day that I've had ... it's nice to be surrounded by the people I love.

It's even nicer that Addison has Excedrin and happily forks over four. The pain in my back from bending over Emma all day has stopped throbbing and gone straight into stabbing. I quickly take them and chase them down with Sprite when she gasps. "Oh my god! Callie!"

"What?" I ask, eyes wide.

"I gave you the Excedrin PM!"

So much for my sex life.

I was definitely looking forward to makeup sex.

I fall asleep in the car on the way home and I'm vaguely aware of Erica coaxing me up the stairs.

I'm also vaguely aware of her undressing me and me trying and failing to undress her.

I eventually become aware of my surroundings, but I have no idea what time it is. The sun is shining and the room is bright, my mouth feels like it has been stuffed with cotton, a dog begins to bark incessantly ... and Jasper flies through the air and lands on the bed next to me.

"Hi, Lee, hi!!" he bellows, slicing through my head. "Hairpanes! We fly hairpanes! Booty did it!"

Buddha leaps onto the bed and growls at me, then realizes that I'm not Erica and attacks my face, trying to lick me to death. I eventually pry him off me and sit up, ruffling Jasper's much longer hair. He leans into my hand, massaging against it like our cats do. "Nice hair, Buddy."

"Mama say they cut it off. Gonna fix my head. Doctor is." He pats his head softly, lost in thought. "Grow back. Grow back real long."

"Yeah, it'll grow back." I tilt his face and look at him. He's tan. He's so much darker than me. "Been swimming alot, Jazz?"

"I swim long time! You want go?"

"This isn't Miami. It's too cold here."

"Cold here," he parrots. "Mama get me jacket. Red jacket. Pretty." I watch Buddha crawl into his lap settle happily against him. Jazz runs his fingers through the dog's reddish fur. "Doctor gonna fix my head," he repeats. "Right, Lee?"

"Right, Buddy."

"Hurt?"

"Yeah, it'll hurt."

"S'okay. I be good."

"I know you will."

He always is.

Please, God, let him be good one more time and come back to me ... whole.


	30. Chapter 30

Erica comes into the room as Jasper is telling me all about the plane ride. He got to watch a movie and the pilot came out and talked to him. When he sees Yellow, he pats the bed and hops up and down in anticipation for her to join us. The movement makes me cringe and I moan pitifully as a muscle spasm tears through my back. Capital punishment doesn't seem to be a deterrent for crime, but I bet forcing someone to stand in one spot for thirteen hours and work with their hands probably would be. I ache in places that I couldn't name and when I push myself up in the bed I can tell that my ankles are swollen. Crocs? Only comfortable when you walk in them. Erica gives Jazz a kiss on the head and asks him to go get a bottle of water from the fridge.

Happy to have something to do, he bounds off the bed which causes it to shake even more. When he leaves the room, Erica locks the door and slides the cover off me. I'm naked except for my underwear and she grins, snapping the waist band of my panties before holding out her hand. When I'm on my feet, she gently hugs me and says, "Hot bath?"

"Definitely," I tell her, my hands on her hips. "Are my parents here?"

"They went into town to pick up something for dinner."

"Dinner?" I glance at the clock, stunned to see that it's after four in the afternoon. "Holy shit. I slept like the dead. I am so sorry that I left you to deal with my family."

"I really don't mind. Your mother spent most of the day fawning over the photos from our trip. It's a good thing we had a second set of copies because she begged for most of them." She smiles at me. "You're cute with bed hair."

I move to the right a little so I can see the mirror and make a face. My hair is sticking straight up like a mohawk in the front and is flat on either side like a mullet. "Oh dear god. I need to go back to bed."

"Your mother is determined to cook fried chicken and homemade peach cobbler. Are you sure you want to go back to bed?"

"Ooooh. I'm not tired at all." I turn the collar down on her shirt and add, "I'm sorry that I fell asleep last night. I had such big plans."

"Baby, you can barely move." She lifts my hand, looking at my swollen wrist. Holding a heavy drill? Not fun. "I know how I feel after ten hours working with just a scalpel. I'll call Webber and ask him to phone in something to relieve the fluid and -"

"Vicodin and a muscle relaxer," I suggest.

She studies my face. "Is it really that bad?"

"The only reason I'm standing upright and have not curled into a fetal position is because I don't want to illustrate how weak I am while you're watching." I shake my head. "My threshold for pain? Nonexistent."

"And yet ... you want to have a baby."

"Epidural, for the win. Ooooh, call Addison and see if she can give me one of those today."

Erica gets a dirty twinkle in her eye. "Are you sure you don't want to feel anything from the waist down? Because I have such big plans for tonight."

Jasper knocks on the door before I can answer and I head into the bathroom as quickly as I can. Bending to turn on the water makes me want to drown. I really, truly need to take an occasional break when I operate. More than five minutes, anyway. I brush my teeth, don't even try to brush my hair before I wash it, and then settle into water hot enough to boil my flesh from my bones. It helps almost immediately and I'm pretty much pain free when Erica comes in. She stares down at me in an appreciative, lustful way that makes my inner thighs start to tremble. I glance down at my own body, trying to see it through her eyes.

I'm not as dark as Jasper, but my skin is definitely cinnamon against the stark white tub. My stomach isn't entirely flat, but it's soft and inviting. My hips are curved and flare out in decent proportion to my legs and my breasts are standing up with pride, topped with mocha colored nipples that aren't too big or too small. I actually like my breasts. I like them so much that I lift my hands and cover them, tweaking slightly so that my nipples stand up at attention for her. I watch her pink tongue slip between her lips as she watches me and I know that she's imagining closing her mouth over one, then the other. She's holding the phone so tightly that her knuckles are white and I smirk at her to make sure she knows that I know exactly what I'm doing to her.

When her gaze moves down my body, I follow it with one hand. I trail a finger over the scar on my abdomen and then skim lightly over my sex and I watch her stop breathing. She's sucking on her bottom lip now. I part my legs a little ... just a little ... and ... the phone rings.

It startles her so much that she drops it in the floor.

I chuckle as she answers it and gives my father directions to the pharmacy we use.

I don't have the heart to tell her that I am feeling no pain at the moment and she really didn't have to ask for any meds. When she hangs up, I say, "Where's Jasper?"

Her face is a little red and she clears her throat. "He, uh, wanted to watch a movie on Disney. Something about a dog that plays basketball."

"He'll be occupied for a while," I tell her and push myself up into a sitting position. "Could you wash my back?"

She sets the phone down on the counter with such haste that she knocks over the container we keep our toothbrushes in. I listen to her swear, trying hard not to laugh at her. I'm pretty sure that if I stuck my hand down her pants right now ... I would find that she's just as wet as I am. I haven't soaped the loofah so she does it herself, covering it with my cherry blossom soap and then working it into a lather. She doesn't move to my back, though. Instead, she takes my hand in hers and soaps it, then my arm. I should have learned never to tease the master because she washes every place except where I want her to touch. She soaps my throat, the valley between my breasts, my ribs and my stomach, but never once touches the painfully hard peaks that I worked into a frenzy myself. I grit my teeth when she reaches into the water, lifts my leg, and soaps my foot and leg. It takes all of my resolve not to laugh because I'm that ticklish. She repeats the process on the other leg and then scrubs my back until I'm groaning with pleasure.

"You missed a few spots," I tell her when she drops the loofah into the water and I fear that she's finished.

"Yes, I know." She pours body wash into her palms and rubs them together. "Those few spots deserve a hands on approach, I think."

Oh god. Her soapy hands move over my breasts, sliding and gliding and teasing, causing me to gasp. She rolls, kneads, and tweaks until my back is arching and I'm squirming enough to splash her. When she slides her fingers between my legs ... I stop moving entirely. She keeps her eyes on mine as she 'washes' me ... if you can call it that. She knows exactly what she's doing and my body is more than willing to respond to every caress, every stroke, every movement. I get off so fast that it takes my breath and it definitely takes hers because I sit up and pull her into the tub with me.

"Calliope Torres! I just bought these pants!"

I silence her with a kiss as I fumble with the buttons of her new slacks. When I finally get them down over her hips I urge her to stand up and I yank them down over her feet, which are thankfully bare. Her shirt comes off next, then her bra and when she's lying naked on top of me ... I'm finally satisfied. But she's not. She dunks my head under the water, trying to repay me and I retaliate by slipping two fingers into her. She pulls me back up and kisses me, hungrily, deeply. Her legs move to either side of mine and she sits up, bracing her hands on the sides of the tub as she rises and falls on my fingers. I enjoy the show, watching her breasts bounce and her hips undulate. Her hair is down, spilling over her shoulders and I can smell her shampoo every time she surges against me. This is exactly how we made love for the first time in my bed in Miami and it takes me back, it takes me forward, it takes me upside down and inside out.

I sit up to capture one of her nipples, but she doesn't let me. She grabs my head, kissing me again and I moan as her tongue moves against mine. Shifting my hand a little, I press my thumb against her clit and massage in a circle. She increases her momentum, nearly frenzied when she releases my face and tosses her head back. I seize the opportunity and latch onto her breast, sucking and nipping at her until she cries out my name. Her nails bite into my back when she comes and I can feel her inner walls grasping and shivering. She buries her face in the crook of my neck and wraps her arms around me. I do the same, clinging to her.

You really can catch forever, you know, you can hold it and smell it and let it carry you away.

We eventually come down and she shifts a little wrapping her legs around me and reaching for the shampoo. She soaps my hair, scrubbing with her nails and making my skin dot with cold chills. She kisses me when my hair is piled on top of my head in a bubbly mess and gets to her feet. "Where are you going?" I ask, reaching up to rub her backside. "I wasn't finished."

She steps out of the tub and blots at her skin with a towel. "Look at what you did to me. I'm soaked -"

"Yeah, I felt that."

"Callie!" Pointing her finger at me she attempts to look stern, but fails beautifully. A smile breaks across her face and she says, "You should be ashamed. Your parents will be back here anytime and your brother -"

I jump suddenly and grab my side, hissing. Out of the corner of my eye, I watch the towel fall from her hands and then she's within arms reach, asking me if I'm okay.

She shouldn't have fallen for it.

When I tug her into the tub this time ... her head goes under and she comes up sputtering.

"Oops," I say as sweetly as I can. "These damn muscle spasms are -"

"I'm going to KILL you!" Erica pushes her hair out of her face. Her eyes meet mine, then move over my chest. "You know ... after you get me off again."

She doesn't kill me.

To thank her for sparing my life ... I get her off twice.

I'm not nearly as sore as I was. Did you know that orgasms release natural pain relievers in your body? I think I read it somewhere and I'm living proof that it's true. I dress in a comfortable pair of cotton pants and a matching shirt before pulling a comb through my hair. Erica is standing at the sink in a towel and I guess she realizes that I'm about to give into the temptation to pull it off because she shakes her head and gestures toward the door, making me leave. I'm forced to dry my hair in our bedroom and I can hear that she's doing the same in the bathroom. I slather my lips with gloss and line my eyes to try to mask some of the exhaustion that's still evident on my face. I finally fluff my hair, making sure the curls I inherited from my dad are hanging just so and then I slip a pair of socks on so that my mother won't see how swollen my ankles are.

Erica comes out as I'm sliding earrings in and she looks me over head to toe. She's wearing her robe since she had no clothing in the bathroom and I watch it fall open as she opens the underwear drawer and rifles inside. She picks blue panties. I fucking KNEW she was going to. This is a new kind of torment for me. I'm mesmerized when she slides them on and step forward to tug them right back off, but the security system beeps to alert us that my parents have arrived. She shoots me a playful look and turns so that I get the full effect of the thong. My mouth goes dry and I can barely stand it. I throw a pair of yoga pants at her and hit her in the head with one of my shirts, watching her dress. It's awful to watch someone who was meant to be naked put clothes on. It's painful. Now I need a morphine drip.

My mom is coming in the front door when I step into the living room. She brightens when she sees me and I do a double take. She's lost weight. She's lost a LOT of weight. Her hair is not teased into a crazy hive, either. It's tamed down into a cute bob and she puts the grocery bags in her hands down in the foyer so she can hug me. "You look incredible," I tell her. "God, you're gorgeous!"

"Your daddy talked me into trying the elliptical machine. And I like it." She cups my face, stroking it with her thumb. "You just keep gettin' prettier, angel. How do you feel? Erica told us about that surgery yesterday. I'm proud of you."

I give her a kiss on the forehead. There's something about mothers ... even when your relationship is volatile at times ... their voice, their love ... it makes you feel like a kid again. "I'm okay. Sore. Tired."

"OH!" She lets me go and bends down, holding out a pharmacy bag. "Addison to the rescue. She phoned in a couple of prescriptions for you, honey. Are you having muscle spasms?"

"I am." I accept the bag and glance at the labels. Addison is apparently trying to apologize for knocking me out ... by knocking me out again. I have to smile. Erica will kick her ass when she finds out that she's given me such strong stuff. It's overkill. I technically could have survived with a Tylenol, but who am I to pass up total relaxation?

Erica comes down the stairs with a laundry basket and smiles innocently at my mother, then at me as she opens the door to the basement. I hear her gasp and turn in time to see her drop the basket. "Jasper!" she cries. "What in the -"

My brother walks into the living room from the basement and I'm sure he's looking guilty underneath the mess that covers him head to toe. Apparently he has found the gigantic tub of Neapolitan ice cream that we keep in the large freezer chest in the laundry room. Buddha is lapping at the rivulets of white, pink, and brown that are running down his legs, then the dog notices Erica and bites her on the foot. Jazz hides his hands behind his back like that's the only guilty part of him. It looks like he put his entire head in the bucket and when Buddha bites Erica again he leans down and picks up his dog. "Bad, Booty! You no bite! No mo i cream!"

"JAZZY!"" Mom cries, scandalized. "What have you done!?"

He looks like she just asked the dumbest question ever. "I eated." My dad opens the door behind Mom and Jasper cuts his eyes over at him. "Uh oh!"

"Uh oh is right, Jasper!" I tell him. "That was very bad!"

"I not bad!" He shakes his head emphatically, making melted ice cream pelt Erica. "I hongry. Gotta eat!"

"Where were you!?" Mom demands, looking at me. "Callie!? Why weren't you watching him?!"

"I had to take a bath," I reply. "I'm sore. I had to soak."

"Of course you did and I was born yesterday!" Mom turns her angry eyes on Erica, looking her up and down. "Why have you changed clothes, Erica? Did you need a bath, too?"

Erica looks like a deer in headlights. "I need to go ... do ... laundry."

"I help warsh!" Jasper bellows. "Dirty! I dirty!"

He licks his fingers as Erica moves around him and descends into the basement. I catch him before he can follow her. "Oh no you don't! Come on, buddy. I'll give you a bath."

"You obviously can't even bathe yourself without help!" Mom growls. She scoops up the bags she put down in order to hug me and huffs past me into the kitchen. "Leaving him unattended to do who knows what. Shame on you! Shame!"

I look at my father, feeling helpless and busted and incredibly embarrassed. "Hey, Dad."

He pulls me into his free arm and gives me a kiss. "Hi, sweetheart. It's good to see you. I missed you so much."

"Stop coddling her!" Mom shouts from the kitchen. "She's just as perverted as you are."

"Eww! My ears!" I step away from him and reach out, offering to take one of the bags. He gasps and cradles my hand in his, his thumb moving over my engagement ring and band. I know it makes me look like I'm already married, but I don't have the heart to just wear the diamond. The eternity band means so much to me ... and Erica wears hers. "Yes, Daddy, that's an invitation for you to give me away."

"I know," he tells me, smiling. "Erica actually called me before you left for Italy and did it the proper way. Your mother, however, has no clue."

"Erica called you?" I don't know why that touches me so much, but it does. The more I get to know Erica Hahn the more she surprises me. She's such a freakin' traditionalist. I can just imagine her fumbling for the words, trying to convey what she wanted from my Dad. "Well, I asked her first so ... I win."

"You didn't!" Dad laughs now, pulling me into his arms. "Well, that certainly explains why this trip to Italy wound up costing so damn much. Did you get her a ring as nice as this one?"

"I got her a Rolex."

"Oh ... for heaven's sake! I thought you were the romantic type, Calliope!" he chastises. "A watch!?"

"Why is everyone so scandalized by that!? I asked her for time. As in forever." I growl. "SHE liked it!"

"Yes, she did," Erica says, closing the basement door. She's smiling when she joins us and proudly holds out her wrist so that my dad can see the watch. He cradles her arm the same way he did my hand, then kisses her on the forehead. Erica grins at him and says, "And don't worry, Santos, she's got the romance thing down pat."

"Well, let me be the first to welcome you to the family and I'll warn you yet again that Latin lovers never, ever give back the hearts that they take." He winks at her. "I'm happy for you both."

"Why are you happy?" Mom asks, stalking back into the room with Jasper on her heels. She has washed his face and hands, but he'll definitely need a bath. His longer hair is standing on end and I'm pretty sure he has chocolate in his ear. "Well?"

I can't say anything. I just ... can't. Because if Mom is rude about it, if she hurts Erica's feelings ... I'll have to ask her to leave. And I really don't want her to go anywhere because I'm so damn glad she's here. Erica is apparently suffering the same dilemma I am because she stares down at the floor like it's the most interesting thing she's ever seen. Fuck it. I'm not going to let Erica be intimidated or ashamed or worried about it. I clear my throat and say, "Erica and I are getting married."

"Wh- what?" Mom's eyebrows vanish behind her neatly trimmed bangs. Her gaze darts to Erica, then at my father, then back to me. "My ... goodness. I -"

"Lori Ann." My dad has a way of saying her name in a way that expresses everything she better not say. "Why don't you ask to see Callie's ring?"

I watch Mom swallow whatever is on the tip of her tongue and then she smiles. Because I know her, I know that it's the fake pageant smile that doesn't mean jack shit. She motions for my hand and gasps when she sees the diamond there. "This is beautiful! Erica, you certainly chose a lovely cut."

"Thank you," Erica tells her and I hear her let out the breath she was holding. "I spent weeks trying to figure out whether it should be round or square or ... I don't know anything about jewelry."

"Ooooooooh!" Jazz leans down low, looking at my ring. "YELLOW! I LIKE YELLOW!"

"I like Yellow, too." I grin at Erica when I say it and I know that she knows I'm talking about so much more than the color.

"This - uh - congratulations." Mom kisses me, then hugs Erica. "I - well ... I should give Jasper a bath because -"

"I'll do it," Dad says. "You go ahead and start dinner. Jazz is apparently hungry."

"Let me show you where the towels are," Erica tells him.

She doesn't need to show him anything, but she wants to give me time alone with Mom. I follow my mother into the kitchen and start unpacking the groceries. All of my favorite foods are inside and my mouth starts watering just thinking about the crunchy fried chicken and flaky cobbler that I'll be smelling soon. I don't say anything as I take the colander from the cabinet and put it in the sink, then I take down a couple of pans from the rack that my mother couldn't reach on her best day. "You really need to teach me how to fry chicken like you, Mom. I know you've tried in the past, but I'm ready to learn now and -"

"How are you planning to marry her?" she asks and I don't have to look at her to know that she's crying. "It's not even legal. And it won't make a difference, honey. It won't be recognized or acknowledged."

"We'll know. We'll acknowledge it." I put a frying pan on the stove and pick up the vegetable oil. "We have the same right as anyone else to stand up in front of our friends and family and -"

"You didn't even see fit to stand up in front of friends and family when you eloped with a perfect stranger!"

"Well, I'm going to rectify that now. I want everyone there. I want Dad to walk me down the aisle and I want you to help me with my hair and my dress and ... I want you to plan a big, stuffy reception and hire a band that I'll hate. I want to stress about the menu and figure out what Addison and Cristina need to wear to completely humiliate them both and -"

"And then it's over and you have nothing to show for it."

"I'll have the rest of my life to show for it. And that's better than any law or piece of paper."

"This is what you want? For the rest of your life?"

"Yeah, Mom. And even then ... it's not long enough. If I live to be a hundred ... it still won't be long enough. This isn't a phase. It's not some experimental thing that I'm going to grow out of. It's me." I reach out and take her hand. It's so much smaller than mine and there are age spots on the back of it. "I know that you have this picture in your head of what you wanted for me, but if you could just see us ... it would more than make up for what you think I'm missing out on. She loves me. And I love her in a way that I never knew I could love another human being."

"Oh, baby, I just worry and -"

"You don't have to worry," I tell her, keeping my voice as gentle as I can.

"Well, I do," she snaps, turning away from me. "What kind of mother would I be if I didn't worry?"

I watch her fill the frying pan with oil and snatch up a bowl, sifting flour into it. She seasons it with pepper, salt, and garlic powder. "Mom, do you ever wonder what our lives would have been like if your parents had accepted Dad? Christmases would have been different. Our birthdays would have been different. I don't want Erica to be my only family the way Dad had to become yours. I want her to be a part of ours."

Mom picks up a spoon, but she doesn't begin mixing the breading. Instead, she stares at something just past me and I turn to see that Erica has walked into the kitchen. I have to wonder how much she overheard because her face is a little red and she looks nervous. It's only a few seconds of silence, but I feel it stretch out so far that I have time to contemplate faking a muscle spasm or something in order to shatter it. "Erica?" Mom finally says, holding out the spoon. "I've tried to teach my hopeless daughter how to fry chicken and I've given up hope. How would you like to learn? Someone in the Torres' family should carry my torch."

"I - I'd love to." Erica sounds as amazed as I feel. I watch with wide eyed wonder as she joins Mom at the island and learns all the secrets of fried chicken that is so good it will curl your toes.

Part of me wants to believe that this is the real thing. Mom has FINALLY accepted us.

But I've been devastated in the past by believing in her.

So, I'm guarded, but I'm also happy enough to join in ... even though it's a lost cause on my part.

When I walk into the hospital the following day for Jasper's pre-op exam, I feel like I'm floating on top of the world. Not only did Erica and I get around to mind blowing make up sex the previous night, my mother has not said or done anything remotely hurtful to either of us. Jasper is also in a good mood, despite the fact that we have been withholding food or water from him since he woke up. There are a few blood tests he'll be undergoing that require an empty belly. He keeps randomly announcing that he wants juice, but I keep explaining why he can't have any. He seems excited about seeing Derek and when he spots him on the breezeway, he calls up a greeting from the lobby. Derek waves down at us, laughing at Jasper's enthusiasm and meets us in the elevator.

The things that happen next are so fast ... that I can barely breathe.

Derek tells us that he had a surgery cancel and he's willing to put a rush on the blood tests and paperwork in order to perform surgery on Jasper today. I think maybe I convinced myself that we'd have a few more days, possibly even a week or so, before the surgery could actually be performed. If I had known it would have been possible for today ... I would have done more with Jasper last night than watch television. I would have taken a walk with him and pointed out the stars or maybe ... maybe I would have gone to the video place and rented 'Wizard of Oz'. I didn't do anything with him that mattered. And I didn't ask God for any special favors when I kneeled down next to the bed with Jazz and led him in prayer. I didn't do ANYTHING that I could have ... if I had known.

I don't even know how the decision is made because I don't remember what I said when my Dad asked for my opinion, but whatever it was ... it must have been something positive. Because my parents agree to go through with it today. We're taken to a private room where Erica takes Jasper's blood because he doesn't seem to want Meredith Grey to do it. He actually pushes Meredith away very gently and tells her 'no, thank you'. Erica coaxes him until he lets her stick him and when she asks if it hurt, he tells her yes and not to ever do it again.

I stand on the outside, literally feeling like I'm floating in and out of consciousness as I watch him. He likes the skid proof socks that he's given and thinks the gown is intriguing with its shoulder snaps. He's so easily amused and blessedly clueless about what's coming. It's not like it was with Emma. We had to lie to her so that she wouldn't be scared. And my mother keeps telling Jasper the truth, that he's going to have surgery, and he doesn't know how to be scared. I don't even know if he understands what surgery is. Or that he could go away and never come back. He's just happy to be. He sits quietly on the bed gazing at the curtains, the television, and intently rubs the skid proof bottom of his sock.

Mom announces that she needs coffee and my dad escorts her to the cafeteria. Erica sits down in the ugly mauve chair against the wall and I take a seat beside Jazz, facing him. He grins at me and unsnaps his gown, giggling when I snap it back. He stops laughing when I don't join him and touches my chin. "Wrong, Lee?"

"Nothing, buddy."

"Lie. You no lie Jazz."

I reach out and take his large hand in mine. A few days before the boat crashed, he put his ten year old palm against mine and told me that he wished he was my big brother. He wanted to be older than me so he could take care of me. Those were his exact words. He said that Joel wasn't a good big brother and he could do it better. As I stare at his face, I know that he has grown past me in leaps and bounds. Yes, he's taller and his shoulders are broad and strong, but his heart is so much bigger and older than mine could ever be. Sometimes I think my heart only beats because his does and if, god forbid, he dies today ... I'll have to break every promise I made to Erica about forever because I'll HAVE to go with him. He doesn't like being alone.

"They're going to cut your hair off," I tell him, brushing his bangs off his forehead.

He reaches up and touches his hair. "Grow back. Mama said. You said grow back."

"And it'll hurt, Jasper."

He points at his IV. "Like that?"

"Worse."

I hear the chair shift behind me and then Erica's touching my shoulder. "Don't scare him, Callie."

"He has a right to know."

"I not scared." Jasper grins the patented, happy go lucky grin that makes me want to hug him and never let go. "Gonna fix my head."

"That's right, Jazz," Erica tells him, her voice soothing. "You're going to be just fine."

"And I not cry, too. So don't you." He reaches out and touches my cheek. I didn't even realize I was crying. I let him pull me into his arms and close my eyes as he rubs my back. You'd think that I was going into surgery and he was telling me to be brave. "Hey, Dyson!"

I hear Addison greet my brother and move out of the way so she can hug him. Mark is standing behind her and Jasper cries, "Ass!" gleefully. Everyone laughs except me. Jazz doesn't know why everyone is doting on him or why Addison and Erica keep shooting each other worried looks every time I don't answer something they ask me right away. I can't. This is what I do. I run. And if I can physically run ... I sprint to the nearest corner of my mind and shut down. I did it on Cristina's couch after Miami. I did it in the Archfield when George said he cheated. I did it again after Mark and I broke up. And I'm doing it now ... even if I don't want to.

I feel like I'm sleepwalking as one hour becomes two, then three. Finally ... the results are back and Derek says that he's ready when we are. No one says goodbye to Jazz. He doesn't like goodbye and when I kiss him, his brown eyes are full of wonder and expectation. He's going somewhere new, somewhere with Meredith and Derek and Chief Webber, who announced that he would be scrubbing in as well. And then Bailey comes out of nowhere, telling me that she's going to go and 'supervise', but I don't chuckle the way Erica does or smile the way my mother does.

When they open his head ... the blood that falls ... that's on MY hands.

The scars are on me.

And if he wakes up wrong ... I will never be right.

If he goes to sleep forever ... I'll have to sleep, too.

We all walk into the hallway to watch them wheel him away. I hear him chattering about the overhead lights and then his head pops up over the back of the stretcher. They're taking him away, but he's watching us leave. He raises his hand and waves, then blows a kiss and I swear to God ... when the elevator doors close behind him ... my heart is stuck between them. I feel like the life is being sucked out of me.

My mother starts to cry first and I can hear Dad comforting her. He's saying all the things you say to someone who may or may not be losing a loved one. Listening to him doesn't comfort me. I'm a doctor. I know that one millimeter too deep with the saw will kill Jasper. I know that the scalpel slipping over his eye will blind him. I know that the anesthesiologist isn't perfect and he could easily over medicate Jazz. I know that waking up is never a guarantee and putting something foreign into anyone's body could backfire the instant it touches. I know ... because I learned it. I know ... because I've lived it. I know ... because I've walked down the hallway into the room that Mark is leading us to now ... to tell a family like mine that their loved one didn't make it.

As I sit down beside Erica and she puts her arm around me, I realize that I never truly apologized to Jasper for pushing him down the time he broke my Walk Man. He was just a baby, still in diapers, and I bruised his leg. I also broke his heart. And I should have apologized before he was ten years old, before he got hurt, while he still remembered it. I should have made more time for him that summer, too. Because me being away at college was hard on him. It was always hard on him and he kept a calendar in his room counting down the days until I'd be home again. I should have made sure he knew that I counted them, too. And I couldn't wait to be home with him any time I could be.

Jasper didn't want to go out on the boat that day. He begged me to take him to the skate park and I refused. Sitting on the concrete watching him skate back and forth just didn't sound as appealing as working on my tan while the wind whipped through my hair. I can remember how little he looked sitting on the leather seat with his scabby knees pulled up to his chin and his arms wrapped around his legs. He had on his elbow pads because he was convinced that I was going to take him skating as soon as we got back home and I let him believe that to get him to go. I put my arms around him before I went to the front of the boat to sunbathe and we looked at dolphins over the rail.

His fingernails were dirty when he reached out like he could touch them.

I remember telling him that he was a dirty little man. I was only playing with him, but when I stretched out on my towel and glanced his way ... he was studying his hands in earnest. Everything I said to him was something important because I was more than his big sister. I was his friend. And he was my biggest fan.

I don't think he ever knew that I was his, too. That I still am.

I kept his photos all over my dorm room and his old skate board, the one he outgrew, sat on top of my desk. I'd spin the wheels when studying became too tedious and it would make the same sound it made when he pushed it along the asphalt, making it sing. He always begged to go to school with me, but he was really there all along. All the time.

And he's here now, sitting in this room, staining us all.

"Callie?" Erica puts her head against mine. "Baby, he's going to be just fine."

I nod, but I don't say anything. I don't even breathe too loud because if I give an inch ... I'm going to break into a million pieces and never stop crying. I also pick a spot on the wall to stare at because if I look at my parents - I'll fall right over the edge. The door opens after a while and Addison slides into the seat beside me, holding out a can of soda. I shake my head and Erica takes it, opening it. Nudging me, Erica offers it to me but I don't take it.

"You haven't had anything to drink all day," she tells me. "I think the cafeteria has something decent today. You want to go get something to eat?"

I shake my head once again. It feels so heavy that it takes everything in me to do so.

She tucks my hair behind my ear, straightening my earring and tracing my lobe. "How about dessert? I'm sure they have something sinfully chocolate and full of calories. I'll even buy it and pretend that I don't mind."

I wish I could tell her thank you. I wish I could say anything.

When I still don't reply, she rubs my arm. "If you'll humor me with some water ... I'll order pizza for the next month."

"She's right, Cal. Just ... drink something," Addison says. "Please?"

Instead of replying, I get up and walk to the window. I want to tell her that Jasper was thirsty, too. He asked for juice and we told him no again and again. He went into surgery hungry and thirsty. Feeling like he felt is a small price to pay really. As I watch it start to rain, I tell God that I'll gladly fast until Jasper can eat if he'll spare him and let him come back. I don't even care if he comes back cured. I just want him back. I'll take him and his half life over no life at all. I shouldn't have pushed to change him. What I should have done ... is thanked my lucky stars that we still had him.

Everyone is talking around me, but it's just noise.

I hear Erica telling someone to leave me alone and I'm grateful.

I'm so damn grateful that she knows me the way she does.

I stand at the window so long that my hip, the one that was injured so badly in the boating accident, starts to throb. I take that as a sign that they're cutting into Jasper's head now. I ache in the spot where I was hurt because it's all connected ... him, me, his head, my hip. They've had enough time to open him up. They've cut off the hair he was so proud of and are undoubtedly peeling back his face and I really hate that I went to medical school at all because I envy the oblivion that my parents have.

The door creaks when it opens and it cuts through my thoughts, but not enough to matter. Nothing matter until something tugs at my shirt, much lower than anyone should tug. I glance down and see a brown doe eye staring up at me. Emma lifts her arms and waits patiently for me to pick her up. It's quiet in the room now and I look to the left, where Mr. Foster is looking apologetic. "I'm sorry to intrude, Dr. Torres," he tells me. "I know that you have a family member in surgery, but she was walking in the hallway earlier and saw you come in here. She said she'll go back to her room after she visits you."

Emma tugs at me again, stepping on my foot to get her point across. I squat down in front of her and she points at what's left of her sad braid. I guess she wouldn't let anyone take it out. She has no problem with me taking it out, though. I pull the elastic band off the tip and it comes easily, since it was barely hanging on. Mom has Jasper's bag and I take out the brush he always uses to comb his doll's hair and pull it through Emma's. Her hair is baby fine, but wavy. I turn her around so that I can braid her hair properly and she doesn't move a muscle as I do it. I make it a little tighter than the last one and carefully secure it, patting her on the back to let her know I'm finished. She touches the braid with her tiny hand and turns to look at me, nodding.

I give her a smile and pull down a little of the gauze on her face to check the bruising. "Does it hurt?" I ask.

She shakes her head, then touches my face. Looking down, she takes the brush from my hand and gently pulls it through the ends of my hair. I stay as still as possible as she twists a small lock into a knot that I'm sure I'll have fun trying to repair later. It's her way of giving me a 'braid'. When she holds it up for me to see it, I do my best to look impressed. "That's very good."

When she hugs me, I can remember being sixteen and Jasper being her size. I can remember the way he smelled after a shower when his sturdy little legs pounded down the hallway so he could give me a hug and kiss goodnight. I can remember picking him up after he fell off his bike and him wrapping his legs around me. I would give anything for to have that again. I pick Emma up now, because she lifts her arms again and when she puts her legs around my waist and I hug her ... she is Jasper. She's exactly what I need to pull me firmly back to the present. She holds onto my neck tight enough to choke me, then leans back and points at my parents, who are both watching me closely. "That's my mom and dad," I tell her.

She turns and looks at her own father, then at mine, as if she's trying to figure out how family trees work. My dad waves at her and my mother is smiling that pageant smile that would win her a crown any day of the week and Emma pushes against me, clearly demanding to be put down. She walks cautiously around the row of seats, never taking her eye off my parents. My mother's cheeks are still wet from her worry over Jasper and Emma picks up the Kleenex in the chair and holds it out to her. "Thank you," my mother says, rubbing the little girl's hand as she takes the box.

Emma's good eye moves over her face and she rubs my mother on the leg, then takes the heart shaped sticker off her shirt and puts it on my mother's. My mom starts to cry again and Mr. Foster takes a step forward to retrieve his daughter, but I shake my head at him. Emma has taken Mom's purse and moved it out of her lap and has climbed into it, making herself at home. She sits perfectly still, letting my mother hug her.

When Jasper first started to walk again and eventually went back to school ... his classmates were relentless in their taunts. He would come home yelling the same ugly words they called at him and my mother explained to him that he was different, he was one of God's special children.

Special children come in all shapes and sizes. They can have broken faces, broken minds, or cancer that robs them of their vitality, but every special child has a gift.

Emma Foster's gift is to soothe.

She lets her presence do what she can't do with words.

She invites you to hold onto her when you feel like your world is in a tailspin.

Mr. Foster seems at ease with this aspect of his daughter's character. He moves into the corner of the room and picks up a magazine, sitting quietly in one of the chairs. He seems to understand that my family can use a little dose of special since our most special member is absent.

When I sit beside Erica now, I take her hand.

And I take the bottle of water that Addison offers, taking a sip.

I swear ... even with her non-working jaw and inability to do so ... Emma Foster smiles as me.

I see it in her eye.

I feel it in my heart.

After Emma falls asleep and her father takes her back to her room, Addison is paged. She gives me a quick hug before she hurries out of the room and Cristina appears out of nowhere, taking her place. Yang's posture is horrible and I can see that my mother has it on the tip of her tongue to tell her to sit up straight. Slumped down with her arms crossed and her legs wide, Cristina says, "You should have told them that you wanted me in there with your brother. I am the best, you know?"

"Yang!" Erica snaps, sitting forward in her seat to glare at the younger woman. "If you keep trying to get into every surgery, I'm blackballing you from mine! I mean it!"

"You take so much time off that I'm blackballed anyway!" Cristina tells her. "I haven't seen anything good in weeks."

"You little liar!" I accuse. "You helped me with Emma!"

"Holding clamps is not the same as holding a heart." Yang has perfected the art of pouting. She's got her arms crossed tightly over her chest and looks miserable. "This sucks. All I've had today was a kid with strep throat and a sprained ankle. Why couldn't it have been a broken ankle?"

I roll my eyes. "Stop pretending that you like ortho! For God's sake ... just give him your phone number."

"What!?" Cristina sits up fast, back ramrod straight. "I would - why would you - that's ridiculous."

Erica leans forward again. "You have a thing for Cole?"

"I do not!"

"It was a question, Yang, not an accusation," Erica tells her, glancing a me and then back at Cristina. "I think you should go for it. The two of you ... you and Cole ... that would be ..."

"Cute?" I offer.

Erica frowns. "Well, not. Not really. Two repulsive people can't do 'cute', but it would be -"

"Convenient?" Yang asks. "Get him out of the picture so he can stop flirting with Callie?"

Erica's eyes narrow. "Why don't you go find something to do before I go flip through the charts and find something for you?"

"You're not the boss of me!" Yang says. "You're OFF today. You can't pull rank."

I look at my mother, who is watching the exchange with a smile on her face. She clears her throat and says, "You should stay, Cristina. We need to discuss your duties as Callie's bridesmaid and -"

Yang makes a sound between a cough and a sputter. On my other side, Erica sounds like a cat that just had it's tail stepped on. "NO WAY!" they both say as one, followed by, "You are not being a bridesmaid, Yang!" and "I'm not being a bridesmaid, Callie!" and "You're damn right you're not!" which Cristina takes offense to so she growls, "I CAN IF I WANT TO!"

Caught in the middle, I can only sit completely still as they lean forward and glare at each other. "Forget it!" Erica snaps. "I will happily look at any face except yours on my wedding day!"

Yang's bottom jaw drops open and her nostrils flare dramatically. "Like I want to see you outside of work at all!"

"Then it's settled!" Erica's voice rises a little. "Your invitation can get lost in the mail!"

"IT WILL NOT!" Yang's voice rises a little higher. "I'm Callie's fri - er - coworker. I can be there if she wants!"

"Wrong!"

"Callie!" They both say my name with equal measures of venom.

I take a deep breath, trying to appear as conflicted as I possibly can. "Erica, Cristina was a very good fr - uhm - coworker to me and I'd like her to be there. In the wedding party."

"Great!" Erica says, throwing her hands up. "We'll have horrible wedding pictures. Just look at her badge!"

Cristina looks down at her badge before I can, lifting it in her hand. "There is nothing wrong with my picture! And since all eyes will be focused on The Bride of Frankenstein, you shouldn't worry."

"You just insulted Callie!" Erica points a finger at her, but I grab it with my own. She looks at me intently, then at Cristina. "Fine! Be a bridesmaid, but if you trip or do anything else ..."

"Be a bridesmaid?" Cristina suddenly looks like her puppy died. "Wait ... I thought we were arguing about me going to the wedding. You know ... as a guest."

"It'll be fine," I tell her, patting her leg. "I was thinking baby pink dresses with matching ribbons in your hair."

"You're trying to humiliate me!" Yang accuses. "You didn't even ask me!"

"You didn't ask me either and I had to rearrange my whole afternoon, which included surgery, so that you could suck the life out of me at a bridal shop!" I cross my arms over my chest. "That was horrible!"

"It was not horrible! You laughed at me until you peed! You said so!"

"And I also kept the evil mothers at bay with my wicked lying abilities so you owe me!"

"Oh, screw this!" She jumps to her feet, making her sneakers squeak on the floor. "You wouldn't do baby blue and I don't do pink. Or ribbons. Or -- fluffy. I mean it! I - I'm going to the clinic. I'll take a sore throat over this any day of the week."

"Bye," Erica tells her on the way out.

"You are horrible!" I tell her when Yang slams out of the room. "What was that!?"

"That's Yang." Erica waves a hand. "And I got her to do what you wanted, didn't I?"

"You are so bad!"

"Yeah, I know." She shrugs, then turns in her seat a little. "You were kidding about the pink, right?"

I keep my face impassive. "It's fitting, right? Two women. Pink."

"Oh, dear God ..."

When I smile at my mother, she's watching us with a newfound interest.

It's almost like she's finally seeing us.

The passage of time is consistent. Just like I told Erica when I proposed, there are sixty seconds in every minute and sixty minutes in every hour, but the way it passes is never, ever consistent. When it's the last day of school, you watch the second hand and it feels like it never moves. But on a timed test day at school, it feels like the hands have been sped up and every time you glance at the clock you gasp. Waiting for news about Jasper feels like the last day of school. Every time I glance at Erica's watch it's only five minutes since the last time and I'm tempted to take it off her wrist to make sure it's still ticking. Joel calls after the five hour mark and I listen to my mother explain that no news is good news.

That's not always true.

The surgery could have come to a stand still because Jasper died and all of my coworkers could be drawing sticks to see who has to come and tell us. Or there could be a problem with the equipment and everything's been halted until something new can be brought in. Or ... I have to stop thinking about it. Because maybe Derek is just being as thorough as he possibly can be and I should put my faith in that.

An hour ago, I took one of the pills Addison prescribed and since I haven't eaten ... it's gone straight to my head. I know, I should be ashamed because I didn't really need it, but the pain in my heart suggested otherwise. No one saw me do it, but I'm pretty sure that Erica suspects something when I put my head in her lap and close my eyes. She pulls her fingers through my hair and gets tangled up in the knot that Emma put in it. I fall asleep as she's tenderly working it out and when I wake up, my ears feel like they've been stuffed with cotton. It's a horrible feeling and tug my earlobes when I sit up, trying to figure out what woke me up.

I don't have to wonder long.

Derek is standing in the doorway with the chart in his hand and I hold my breath, finally remembering where I am and what he's here for. The fact that he shuts the door behind him makes me feel claustrophobic. I only shut that door when I have horrible news for a family and I always hear it click behind me with the same reverberation of a gunshot piercing a silent night. The news that I deliver when that door is closed ... is the same ... it's a gunshot wound through the heart and I have to walk away and leave them to bleed out alone because I'm a doctor, but I can't repair everything.

Shepherd doesn't look at me.

He doesn't look at Erica either and it's because we know. It's because we can see it in his face and he'd rather say it to my parents than confess that he failed to his peers.

"Dr. Shepherd," my dad is on his feet and there's an anxiousness is his voice that I've never heard him use before. This? This is like being a play and forgetting your lines.

"Mr. and Mrs. Torres," Derek says, gesturing at the chairs they vacated. They're on their feet. I'm unable to make it to mine. "Why don't you sit down?"

Erica snakes her arm around my waist and takes my hand in hers. I'm still leaning toward her and I let her pull me so that I'm against her, so that she's holding me up at all. I'm grateful for it. I'm so damn grateful to have her there that I want to convey that with my eyes since my voice won't work at all, but I can't look away from Derek. I've never figured out what women see in him. Yes, he's got perfect hair and being the head of neuro gives him a sexy, powerful air, but I never understood the McDreamy quality. When he turns his face towards me and smiles, though, I absolutely, beyond of a shadow of a doubt, love the man.

He is absolutely the McDreamiest man who ever McDreamed.

"He's okay," I say and it's not a question.

Derek nods his head, which is still covered with his ferry boat cap. "He came through the surgery just fine and I really feel like I was able to get the transmitters far enough into the damaged area to maximize the stimulation when we start that. I don't want to rush because there will be swelling and the risk of exacerbating it outweighs the benefits of beginning immediately. We'll monitor the swelling for a few days and make sure that he's immobile -"

"Why - why does he need to be immobile?" Mom asks. "He can't walk around? He can't -"

"I'm going to use medication to keep him sedated until the swelling is manageable," Derek tells her, putting his hand on her shoulder. "It's common after an invasive brain surgery to keep the patient completely motionless. The less work the brain has to do while it heals, the better."

"It's safe," I tell her. "He'll just be asleep for a while."

Dad rubs her back, speaking to Derek from behind her. "I've read everything about this procedure. I've researched it and tried to understand it, but what I could never find is what we should expect when you do start stimulating his brain with the transmitters. Realistically, what will happen inside his head when you do that?"

"Realistically," Derek says, "Jasper will complain of a headache. It will feel like a migraine and he may cry, he may shout, he may demand that we stop. He may have mood swings that he has never experienced before because the pulses that will shock the damaged areas of his brain will cause chemicals to release incorrectly for a while. He could feel happy when he should be sad or cry when he means to laugh, but we can control those chemicals with medication when and if it happens. There's no guarantee that he will show any adverse signs or respond to the stimuli at all. Every case is different and that's why this procedure is still being performed on a trial basis. There's just not enough data to support anything as concrete. He may or may not have a reaction like anything we've documented in the past."

"You said before," Mom says, "that the first few stimulations will be as dangerous as the operation. So he's not out of the woods yet, is he?"

Derek doesn't respond right away and I know exactly what he's doing. He's picking and choosing the smallest words from the jumble of medical terminology in that he carries around in his own head. When he does speak, his voice is so soft that I have to strain to hear it. "Everything about this procedure is dangerous, Mrs. Torres. I would say that we have walked him over halfway through the process, though. This next leg of the journey is his and how he responds to the rest of the treatment is ... anyone's guess. It is dangerous and I will be definitely be holding my breath when I turn the machines on for the first time because I don't know what will happen, but I can assure you that whether he's in or out of the woods ... I'm going to be beside him every step of the way."

"Thank you, Dr. Shepherd." My mother reaches out and hugs him and he smiles. When you're a doctor, you savor every moments like that because they don't happen nearly enough. When Emma's mother hugged me, I floated down the hallway on air.

I open my mouth to ask him if we can Jazz yet when his pager goes off.

Derek pulls it from his clip, glances down at it, and his smile vanishes in a flash.

When he turns and rushes from the room ... Erica catches me around the waist and that's when I realize that I was trying to chase him.

I know ... in my gut ... I know that something has gone very, very wrong.

And when I hit my knees now ... Erica goes down with me, anchoring me as I start to pray with all that I am.

God ... please.

Please.

Please!


	31. Chapter 31

When Jasper was seven and I was seventeen, he offered to be my date for the prom. No one asked me. No one ever asked me anything in school except to move or to not exist. I was too tall to blend in, too ethnic to be a wallflower, and too smart to stay below their radar. I was used to gum in my hair or spit balls landing in my lunch tray. It was common to have a foot dart out in front of me as I walked to my desk and even more common to be the butt of their jokes. The weeks leading up to prom brought out the worst in people. I waited until the last possible second to buy my one lone ticket because I knew that everyone would find out that it would just be me going. And I'd have hell to pay for it. I didn't want to go at all, but my mother, who incidentally was the prom queen, the homecoming queen, and head cheerleader, acted like I had just committed a triple homicide when I told her I didn't plan on attending. She had me measured that same day and went through bolts of fabric until she found the perfect prom material.

It was blue.

At least it wasn't pink.

Jasper told me that I was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen and gave me a kiss. He had chocolate on his lips and my mother scolded him for ruining my makeup, but I didn't mind. I let my mother believe that I plans with a group of friends and climbed into the vacant limousine by myself. I let the chauffeur drive a few miles down the road while I ripped up my prom ticket and let it fly out the window in pieces. The driver made a big circle and let me out a few blocks from my house after thirty minutes. The fact that I gave him two hundred bucks sent him on his way with no questions asked and I took off my shoes and ran for home. I had to go the back way, creeping over sand dunes, and when I could see Jasper's bedroom window ... I turned on the walkie talkie he had given me.

I spent my prom night with Jasper.

He brought me jeans and a t-shirt in his backpack and we headed down the beach to a traveling circus. We fed peanuts to elephants. We drove the bumper cars and ate funnel cakes until our bellies ached. When the carnival shut down at midnight, we strolled up and down the shopping district and he told me that even without my dress ... I was so pretty that he was proud to be my 'date'. He helped me put my prom dress back on when we were within sight of our house and he scaled the side of it with the agility of a mountain climber. I went in the back door and my parents were waiting up for me, both of them questioning me at once.

I told them that I had met a guy ... the greatest guy in the world ... and we had danced until my feet ached.

When I went upstairs, Jazz was waiting to help me pull all the clips and pins from my hair and he brushed through it. We snuggled under the cover together and watched movies until dawn. It was, hands down, the best night of my high school life. I had the kind of prom night that I still look back on fondly. I didn't miss out on anything by not going. Because Jasper's laughter when he cornered me in the bumper cars and his sticky hand in mine as we ran from ride to ride ... that's something that can never be taken away from me.

When Jasper was nine and I was nineteen, he wrote a story about his hero for school. I was away at college and Mom sent me his report in my biweekly care package. I had it framed and spent the night reading the scraggly, sprawling cursive handwriting he was attempting to master. He wrote that his big sister was smart, pretty, and good to him. He said that I always listened, I always played with him, and called him a lot at bedtime to say good night. He ended it by saying that I was his best friend and he wanted to grow up to be just like me.

Although he didn't know it ... I wrote a paper about him, too.

After his injury.

Because I wanted to get into an advanced class and his case was so familiar to me.

I didn't call him my brother in it, though. I referred to him as Patient A.

I should not have written about his head.

I should have written about his heart.

Waiting rooms should be renamed something more sinister. Because waiting implies that there's something worth waiting for and when you're waiting to hear whether or not you still have a brother ... it's torture. Erica and I saw a Medieval Torture Museum in Italy and as I gaze at the silent phone, the dragging clock, and sit in a chair so stiff that I can barely move, I know that this is a torture that exceeds the cruelty of anything the museum showcased. When Derek left the room and my prayers became nothing but a silent plea that only I had to endure, my mother took up the cause. She called Joel and told him that something must have gone wrong and asked him to call the 'prayer chain' at the church.

Right now in Miami, there are people begging God the same way I did.

Erica is sitting so close to me that every ragged breath she takes seems to radiate from me or maybe through me. I can't tell if I'm breathing at all. I'm back in that foggy, half aware place that I keep cleaned out for occasions like this. A bomb could go off in front of me and I probably wouldn't feel the burn, hear the explosion, or see the light. I feel like a part of me has already died, already been buried, and now I'm just waiting for the dirt to settle and trap me forever. My brother could be dead right now. They could be shocking him. They could be doing CPR. Or they could be calling it.

I glance at the clock and note the time.

Is Jasper dead?

It's nearly six in the afternoon.

Will he be alive at six thirty?

How about seven?

Or did he die just after five when Derek ran from the room?

Who will write up his toe tag?

It should say Jazz ... not Jasper.

I'm aware of red hair swimming in my periphery and when Addison speaks it sounds like she's at the end of a long tunnel. I hear her asking me if I need anything. Why would she ask that? Can she go and get Jazz and bring him to me? No, she can't. So she needs to not ask me if I need anything when she obviously can't give me what I need. My ears are ringing now, drowning out everything and I close my eyes, conjuring the image of Jasper covered in ice cream.

At least he got to eat something good before he ... died.

Is he dead?

I have to know.

When I get to my feet and take a step forward it feels like I'm walking sideways. The room feels like it has been built on a slight incline. My father's voice breaks through the storm in my head, but I don't pay any attention. I walk into the hallway and a part of me registers that it's bustling with activity. It's enough of a recognition to piss me off. How dare the nurses and doctors in this place bustle back and forth, rubbing in the fact that they're alive and fine. Time should stop occasionally and let you catch your breath ... especially when it's been moving at a crawl to begin with.

Someone puts their hand on my shoulder, trying to restrain me, but I have my eye on the elevator that will take me to the intensive care unit and I have to go there. Maybe I can help. When I reach for the button on the lift, Erica's hand pushes mine away. I know it's her hand because of the watch on her wrist and no matter how I try to let it, the memory of that night in Italy will not come. Nothing will come.

Where was I going?

"Callie, you can't go up there," Addison says gently, standing next to Erica. They're standing in front of me, guarding me or maybe they're guarding my heart. "He's in good hands and you'll just be in the way."

"She's right," Erica tells me in a voice that sounds like I'm a four year old. I need to be spoken to like I'm a child, I guess. "Do you want to go get some fresh air? Let's go outside."

There's no waiting for an answer. She takes my hand and pulls me along beside her. Addison falls in step with us, looping her arm through mine. I stare down at the floor. It's yellow.

Follow the yellow brick road.

Jazz ... Jazz may never hear that song again.

"Wait." I hear myself say it and they stop pulling.

I point at the bathroom and I'm free. Hands fall away from me and I go inside the unisex restroom that's never as clean as it should be. There's only one toilet inside. I shut the door behind me before anyone can follow and lean against it. If I'm going to fall apart I'd rather be alone when it happens. I make it to the sink and splash cold water on my face, then cup my hand and take a few sips. It's lukewarm and tastes bitter. Life tastes bitter. Life is bitter.

And really, I don't know why I do it because I need to be coherent when we get the news.

I need to be completely sane and inside my head, but I can't be.

Not when escaping is so damn easy.

I have my purse and the bottle of pain pills is inside it. Addison prescribed one every four to six hours.

I take three.

Because I don't know if I'll survive four to six more hours.

If Derek tells me that my brother has died ... I will die before I can hit the ground and I want to be numb for the fall.

"Callie?" Erica wiggles the doorknob behind me and I turn the water on again to let her know that I'm still here. I'm still breathing. I'm still alive when I don't really have a right to be ... and then I turn it off and reach for the door.

Whatever is coming ... I'll be medicated enough around the edges to not feel it like a knife in the gut.

"Are you okay?" Addison reaches out and takes my purse, putting it over her own shoulder. She can't lift the weight of the world, though, and it has settled on my spine hard enough to bend it. My shoulders are slumped when Erica puts her arm around them and leads me outdoors.

The sky is overcast.

It's going to rain.

Maybe it will wash us all away.

I'm still awake when Derek comes back in.

I don't want to be awake.

I don't want to be waiting or bending under the crippling assault of memories that I can't really pick from my hazy head. It's all a jumbled mess. Flashes of Jasper move in and out of my mind like a slide show. And he's out of focus in every one. Could I really be forgetting him that fast?

Chief Webber is with Derek.

So is Dr. Bailey.

All we're missing is the chaplain.

Did anyone think to read him his last rites?

I almost laugh at the absurdity of this pomp and circumstance.

"Mr. and Mrs. Torres." Derek doesn't have to tell them to take a seat this time. They didn't have the power to get up. They're slumped together, probably remembering what Jasper's first cries sounded like when Mom finally had him. Hours. She spent hours in labor. "I'm sorry that I've kept you waiting. I wanted to make sure that -"

"Is he dead?" Mom's voice sounds like it's coming from an old victrola. It's scratchy and distant, like speaking any clearer would change the answer to the question. "Is my baby dead, Dr. Shepherd?"

Derek has taken off his scrub cap. How dare he comb his hair before rushing back with the news. I watch him run his hands through that hair now, making it stand up, making it crooked. "No, he's not, but I'm afraid that I don't have very good news."

Dr. Bailey is looking at me.

Stop looking at me.

I must have said that out loud because every eye turns toward me and Miranda looks down at her feet.

Clearing his throat, Derek says, "Jasper has suffered a hemorrhagic stroke. There is bleeding into his brain tissue which caused a hematoma. The good news is that we caught it immediately and have started utilizing blood thinners to try to prevent any clotting or another stroke. The ... the bad news is that this occurred in an area of the brain that controls his motor functions. The best case scenario is that we were fast enough to minimize any long term side effects. However ... there is a strong possibility that he will have lost the use of his limbs and possibly his speech as well."

My father breaks first.

His hands go to his head and he leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he sobs.

I don't watch my mother do the same, but I can hear her.

Addison moves forward when I don't and I can hear her trying to soothe my family.

Erica tries to do that for me, but I don't let her. I can't let her. She told me that Jasper didn't need the surgery and I had to win the fight. I had to push and push and win. I didn't listen. I never listen. The world is black and white for me and it's always got to be MY way.

Jazz ... oh my god ... Jazz.

He's been sacrificed in my battle of wills.

"You can see him now," Chief Webber offers and he's looking at me. He's expecting me to keep a stiff upper lip because I'm a doctor and I'm damn capable of keeping my cool. I feel like screaming at him.

"I want to see him," Mom sobs, clinging to Addison as she gets to her feet.

I'm shuffled along with the small crowd and then we're in the hallway. Someone has their hand on the small of my back now, insistently pushing me onward, forward and I only want to go backwards. I want to go back in time and change it all. I want to take Jasper skating instead of out in the boat. I want to NEVER suggest surgery to my parents because just look at what I did. The elevator dings and the doors slide open in front of me and when I close my eyes now ... I can see nine year old Jasper in the bumper cars and THAT is how I want to see him for the rest of my life. I don't want to see a broken man with tubes and wires and ... legs that may never work again.

I whirl so fast that the entire hospital seems to spin like a top and I make a mad dash for the doors. I've never run faster or for a better reason. The hounds of hell are literally at my feet and if I can make them come after me then they'll leave Jasper alone. I nearly knock over a woman carrying a kid, but I don't stop. I go. I just ... go.

Rain is thundering down so hard that there are puddles on the sidewalk as I race the wind. One block. Two blocks. Three blocks. Then ten. I thunder past the diner that Mark and I used to eat at. I ignore the horn that blares when I don't wait for a crosswalk and I keep going until my lungs are aching and my heart is furiously pounding in an attempt to fly as fast as I am. Just when I'm ready to quit, when I'm ready to give up and let go and fall to the ground, I hear the heavy pounding of footsteps behind me. Two strong arms grab hold of me and my attacker and I both fall. They take the brunt of it as we roll end over end down a grassy slope and finally land in a puddle of water so cold that I cry out in shock.

Before I can voice my protest, Mark Sloan is in my face shaking me so hard that I bite my lip accidentally. "YOU NEARLY GOT HIT BY A CAR! TWICE!"

Did I really? Hmm, I didn't notice. I certainly wouldn't have dodged that if I had.

There's two of him bobbing in and out of focus as he shakes me again. "CALLIE! ARE YOU OKAY!?"

In the distance I can hear a car squeal to a stop. "Do you see them?"

That's Erica.

"Mark!"

That's Addison.

"We're here!" Mark calls out, still grasping me a little too tightly. "What the hell is wrong with you? Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

Honestly.

I think the answer could be yes.

But I don't tell him that.

And he doesn't seem to expect me to because he lifts me and carries me back up the slope.

I don't remember anything at all after that.

"Has she woken up at all?"

"No."

"Should we call her parents?"

"They're on their way back here. Yang said they spent the night in the waiting room, taking turns going back to sit with Jasper."

"We should wake her up and make her eat something."

"She's exhausted. Let her sleep."

"Erica, she's got to face this."

"Leave her alone, Mark."

"She is going to do this as long as you let her," Mark snaps. "When she came back from Miami after her father's surgery she curled up on the couch and didn't move for days. She wouldn't eat, wouldn't speak, wouldn't budge. I had to FORCE her."

"What do you suggest we do?" Erica demands. "Her brother had a stroke. He could die. Thank God she CAN sleep because -"

"Stop it. Both of you," Addison says, then her face appears in front of me and she smiles. "Hey, you. Good morning."

I blink a few times and sit up. Someone took my shoes off and dressed me in a long gown, but I have no clue who that was. I must have slept like the dead because my left arm is numb from lying on it and my shoulder is throbbing incessantly. A look at the window confirms that it's a new day and I stare at the light, dumbfounded. What kind of God would dare let the sun shine on a day like today? This is the first day of Jasper's new life as a vegetable. If he even lives at all.

Fuck.

Here comes the pain again.

"Baby?" Erica sits down next to me, cupping my chin and forcing me to look at her. She gives me a worried smile and says, "Jasper did great all night. He's holding strong and Derek slept on a cot in his room just to make sure he's right there if anything changes."

Her eyes really are the bluest I've ever seen. I want to return the smile or fall into her arms or something, but nothing happens. I wait for my body to move toward her because that's always my first instinct, but instead it moves away. I push myself to my feet, ignoring Addison and Mark as I head into the bathroom and shut the door. They're talking about me. I hear my name even though I turn the water on in the sink. I don't brush my teeth or take a comb to my rain matted hair, though. Instead, I open the medicine cabinet and pick up the strong pain pills that Erica was given after her fine needle aspiration.

It's not wrong to want to sleep.

It's really not.

No one can expect me to stay awake and stay alert when I did this to Jazz.

It's my fault.

The little boy that Jasper never grew up from trusted me with his life and I destroyed it.

I take three pills and wash them down with a mouthful of water, then return the pills safely back to their spot. I'm fascinated by the orderly way the pill bottles are lined up on the shelf. Erica's are on the bottom, mine are on the top. Our community property, pills we both use, are on the middle shelf. I open the box of Benadryl and take two of those, sipping another handful of water.

I'm crazy.

There is a rational part of my brain that keeps bellowing how stupid I am in this moment, but I quiet it down with no problem.

All I hear is Jasper telling me that he wasn't scared, that Derek was going to fix his head, and that Mama said his hair would grow back.

I actually pick up a razor and contemplate cutting my own hair off as punishment for this sick, sick thing I've done to Jazz, but Erica knocks on the door and I put it down.

I don't look at myself in the mirror.

I don't feel like seeing someone I consider a murderer.

"You need to eat, Mija. Wake up, honey, please?"

"What's wrong with her?"

"Calliope! Come on, baby!"

"Santos, something is wrong with her."

"She's just taking it hard, Lori Anne. You know how she is."

"Does she have a fever?"

A warm hand lights on my head and I don't make a sound. "No, she doesn't."

"Erica said for us to wake her up."

Dad shakes me as he repeats my name again. This is the most coherent I've been in ... how long? Where is Erica? Has Jasper died? It's a chore to keep myself limp and an even bigger obstacle not to cry when I hear my mother break down. I feel her hands on my face (I know they're hers because she smells like roses) and then I feel her rest her head on my stomach. Part of me wants to stroke her hair and assure her that I'll be okay just as soon as the drugs wear off ... another part of me wants them to go away so that I can take something else.

I'm not addicted to drugs ... I'm addicted to the oblivion.

I want to stay in this dream place.

It's when I'm asleep ... or even in this halfway place ... that I can see Jasper emerging from the fogginess in my head and giving me his glorious, gorgeous smile. If I open my eyes now ... I may never see it again. So, I stay completely still, forcing myself to breathe in and out as my mother cries and my father pats my hand a little harder, trying to wake me. I fall asleep listening to them talk about the swelling in Jasper's brain. The blood thinners are apparently working and Shepherd is 'cautiously optimistic'.

I'm not.

I could inhale the comforting smell of lilacs for the rest of my life. It's purely Erica, purely heaven, purely bliss. It's the softest, most sensual smell I've ever encountered and I breathe so deeply that my lungs burn. I can feel her body pressed intimately against mine, her hand sliding against my hip, and I stretch when she kisses the back of my neck. I lift my arm and cradle her head when she whispers that she loves me and turn just enough to catch her lips with mine. All the tension drains from my body when I roll over and cradle her face. She's so beautiful, so soft, so real.

She tells me she loves me again and trails something soft over my leg. I look down at the sunflower as it skims my belly and when I smile at her, I realize that we're outside. We're back in the sunflower field in Italy and the sun is rising high, bathing us both in stark light that showcases our polar skin tones; ivory and cinnamon. I watch her pull the sunflower over my skin and realize that she's wearing her fancy red dress and I'm wearing my yellow one and now ... now we're holding hands as we stand on top of Seattle Grace and she's watching me intently, telling me something that I know is important because of the crease in her brow.

'Did you say something?' I ask, but she continues to move her lips and there is no sound.

'I can't hear you. Erica, speak up.' I shake my head in earnest when she points at the hospital, then at me. 'I can't-'

"CALLIE! WAKE UP!"

"WHAT!?" I shout, causing the hands on my shoulders to tighten. My eyes open and the image of Erica in her red dress is replaced by the real deal. She's shaking me furiously and while the crease is evident in her brow, she's wearing something black now. I sit up and shove her hands off me. "Leave me -"

"How much did you take!?"

"Huh?"

"I am so sorry. Lori Anne, I'm sorry." Addison's voice comes from the left and I rub my eyes, looking at the shadows in the room. I think my parents are there and I can see Mark with his arm around Addison. He's saying something to her. Something that I can't hear. "Santos, I didn't know that she would - I'm sorry!"

Addison is sorry. She's sorry for ... what?

Oh my God ...

I know what it means.

Jasper is really, truly ... gone.

And I have numbed myself too much to feel the pain.

I deserve to feel the pain.

Instead, I feel Erica shake me again. I want it to stop. I try in vain to burrow back under the cover and kick the weight of her off the bed. It doesn't work. Someone actually says something about calling 911 and I hear myself saying no ... I hear myself saying that I don't want to go to the hospital because that's where Jasper is. It's so strange, this falling in and out of being. I come and I go and going is so much easier.

It's like being inside a cloud.

"Hey! Einstein!" Erica's voice is so harsh that she cannot possibly be talking to me, but I can see her face just a few inches from mine and I really don't think I'm dreaming anymore. I blink a few times and attempt to focus on her, but she's hazy around the edges. "Callie! Oh, no you don't!"

I must have been trying to lie down because she grips my wrists so hard that it I cry out from the pain as she yanks me up again. We're evenly matched. Even with me half out of my head ... she holds her own as she tries to restrain me. Back and forth it goes. Finally, she tries to shake me again and I smack at her hands. She says my name pleadingly, begging me, and I respond by calling her a bitch ... so she slaps me. Hard. Right on the cheek.

There's chaos all around us now and my mother is sobbing and Mark is yelling and Dad is telling everyone to be quiet. I tune it all out and can only stare at Erica in shock.

I am completely awake.

I'm not even sleepy anymore.

Stunned, I cup my face.

That really, truly hurt.

"What are you doing?" she yells, holding up a pill bottle in her left hand as she glares at me. "Two days! Two days and you've gone through almost thirty pills! How many did you take at once!?"

"You hit me." I announce the obvious, rubbing my stinging cheek. Nothing in this world could have been more sobering than that. Nothing. Erica Hahn has ... hit ... me and in doing so ... she has grand slammed my world off it's axis. Possibly forever.

"Did it get your attention?" There's not a hint of apology. There's not regret on her face. "Or do I need to do it again?"

I must still be dreaming. There is no way in HELL ...

"Erica -" Mark begins.

"Shut up, Sloan!" Erica cuts him off, never taking her eyes off mine. Her jaw is set, lifted slightly like she dares me to say something ... to do something. "I checked the medicine cabinet, Callie. Some of my pills are missing. Did you mix them with yours?"

It's funny how you can run the gamut of emotion without even breaking a sweat. I've gone from shocked, to hurt, to embarrassed that she chose to do this in front of everyone ... to absolutely furious. I'm mad as hell that she has charged through the wall that I so carefully constructed with my medicinal blur. "Yeah, I did! What are you going to do about it!?"

"Get up," she snarls the words, tugging at the cover, but I hold it firm. We struggle for what has to be less than two seconds, but it's long enough to leave me breathless. When I win the tug of war, she latches onto my left hand and twists my rings off. Both of them. My engagement ring and my eternity band slide free before I can stop her and my mouth drops open.

When you take back the promise of forever ... it's almost impossible to ever offer it again.

She really can't be doing this to me.

I only thought that feeling her hand crack against my face was shocking. This? This is the death I keep thinking of chasing down. "Erica -"

"Shut up!" I watch her slide OUR FUTURE over her index finger. They only fit part of the way. My life ... only fits her part of the way. "You have two choices," she tells me. "You can get off your ass and go flush every pill in that bathroom down the toilet and wear these rings again ... or you can get off your ass and pack your shit because I will not go down this road with you."

Words are so elusive that it feels like I've never been taught to speak at all. "But -"

"THERE IS NO BUT, CALLIE!" she yells. "You KNOW that I watched my parents do this! How dare YOU!?"

"I - I didn't -"

"WHAT IS IT GOING TO BE, TORRES!? ME?" She throws a pill bottle into my lap and I can hear the few that remain roll around. "OR THAT!?"

The bottle feels like it weighs fourteen tons. This is what Addison is apologizing for ... prescribing so many pills so easily, for trusting that I would use it as directed. For believing that I needed it at all. I stare at my name on the label and it makes me sick at my stomach to even think about swallowing down another. What have I done? I may as well have stuffed every single one of the Vicodin into Erica's mouth and forced her to swallow. I've killed her by doing this to her ... to us. I can't look at her when I say, "You."

"Speak up when you talk to me!" Erica snaps.

I don't think anyone in the room is breathing ... especially me. "I pick you."

"Prove it."

When she pulls the cover back this time ... I don't fight with her. Someone has dressed me in sweats and a tank top or maybe it was me, I don't know. I don't remember anything. Except that I love her and I don't know what I'm doing anymore. My legs are shaky when I stand and she's there beside me, but she holds me at arm's length when I try to hug her. She doesn't want my comfort or my apologies ... I've gone too far. She points at the bathroom and I know that every eye is on me when I follow her. Everything has been haphazardly scattered on the counter. Midol, Benadryl, a bottle of Nyquil ... everything. My eyes meet hers in the mirror and she raises a brow, challenging me.

What can you do when the ultimatum that you're pretty sure scares you more than anything ever could ... has been thrown down at your feet? What I do ... is pick up the medication that is prescribed to her, the pills that I took, and twist the lid off. I dump them into the toilet and add mine to the mix. Muscle relaxers, allergy meds, anything and everything that could give me a buzz or a crutch to lean on mixes together and it's another rainbow ... just like the Tums that I vomited while I was so sick. I may not be puking my guts up now, but I'm purging my system all the same. When everything has been dumped in and capsules are slowly breaking open in the water ... I break open, too.

"I'm sorry," I sob, wrapping my arms around myself. "I don't know what I -"

"Flush it."

"Erica -"

"FLUSH IT!"

I hit the handle and watch the colors vanish and I circle the drain with it, watching, falling. There really is such a thing as rock bottom. What I've done ... is selfishly took care of my own pain at the expense of Erica's. Instead of letting her pull me through this nightmare with Jasper, I shoved her into one of her own ... where I phased her out the same way her parents did. I didn't let her help carry my burdens ... I saddled her with new ones.

I failed her.

Every time we're happy, every time we're content and settled, I ruin it and give her reasons to doubt me. I don't blame her for taking my rings. I don't blame her for being ready to throw in the towel. Why should she trust me when I've made her recognize every one of her fears in me?

I know that being left behind terrifies her and I've done it more than once.

And I tried to use drugs, another of her fears, to escape from the reality of my life when the reality is ... as long as she is beside me ... there's nothing I can't face.

I turn to tell her what I've realized and I know that we have an audience, I know that everyone is watching, but I already look like a fool so I don't care. I start to kneel down because I'm prepared to beg, but she catches me and pulls me into her arms, saying, "Don't you ever do this again. Ever."

"I won't." I hold her so close that it aches. All of me. I hurt inside and out. "I didn't - I wasn't -"

"Shhhh." She shifts just a little, leaning back so she can look at me. Her palm slowly moves over my cheek, then she kisses it. "I'm sorry I hit you. I - I had to get your attention and - you know that I would never hit you in anger ... don't you?"

I nod at her. "I know. And I - Erica, I am so sorry that I-"

"Don't." She glances at the doorway, where my mother is watching us like a hawk. "Do you want to take a shower?"

"I want my rings back." I hold my right hand out, palm up, but she shakes her head. "But-"

"I took them off you ... and I'll put them back on."

"When?" I don't care that I'm pathetic. I start to sob again and I can feel my nose running. I know that it's red and swollen and my eyes are the same way, but I can't help it. "You said -"

"When the shit that you put into your system is out of it ... we'll talk. I'm not doing this until you're sober."

"Doing what?" I hear the bathroom door click shut and someone, probably my father, has given us much needed privacy. "Are you breaking up with me?"

"Don't you think I should?"

"NO!" I hang onto her, not letting her move away. "I fucked up! Okay? I get it! I fucked up and -"

"Stop it!" She grips my face and I watch her glare at me with the same look of contempt she usually reserves for Yang. "You don't 'get it', Callie. You're eyes are so fucking glassy right now that you probably don't even know where you are!"

"I'm at home with you. I'm where I'm supposed to be."

"Take a cold shower, put on something clean, and be downstairs in thirty minutes so that you can eat the dinner your mother cooked." She pushes me away and turns on her heel, but I grab her arm. Erica brushes me off like I'm a mosquito, wrinkling her nose with disdain. "Do not touch me when you're like this!"

"I'm fine. I'm sober."

"No, you're not. You want to know how I know?" She tilts her head just a little. "Because you haven't asked about Jasper at all. If you were not stoned out of your fucking head ... then he would be the first and only thing on your mind right now."

She throws a towel at me and it hits me in the face.

By the time I lower it ... she's gone.

I take a cold shower.

It chills me to the bone, but I still take my time. At least if I'm concentrating on the cold I can't concentrate on how badly I fucked up. Or all the things I don't know about Jasper. When I finally scrub my skin clean and wash my hair twice, I step from the shower and wrap myself in Erica's robe. It doesn't give me what I need. I can be warmed at all. Even though the wonderful scent of her clings to every fiber ... the absence of my rings make me feel like I've been packed in ice.

When you come to the realization that YOU alone have screwed up everything and everyone in your life ... it feels like being stranded on an iceberg. I've devastated myself. I go through the motions of brushing my teeth and pulling a comb through my hair and then I get dressed. I put on thick, flannel pajamas because my teeth are chattering and my hands are shaking too much to search for anything else in the drawers. I sit down on the bench at the foot of the bed and tug on a pair of socks and the realization that I've slept through two days ... TWO DAYS ... of what could be Jasper's last makes my stomach seize up in knots and start to ache.

I don't even know how he is.

I have my face buried in my hands and I'm losing a battle with tears when the door creaks open. I look up fast, feeling guilty for indulging in my own pain when I've caused so much. My mother is carrying a cup of tea and she hands it to me, sitting next to me on the bench. I have to blink a few times through my tears to recognize her. I think I had forgotten that she had lost so much weight. She seems smaller without the beehive in her hair. I sip the peppermint concoction she has put together as she rubs my back and says, "I'm mad as hell at that - that woman for hitting you. So is Mark. Your father and Addison, however, are on her side."

"You KNOW she only did it to get my attention."

"Has she hit you before?"

"Never."

"She's lucky I didn't rip her hair out." Mom rubs my cheek, sighing. "Jasper would-"

"Is he -" I can't bring myself to even suggest it out loud. "How is he?"

"He's hanging in there, baby." Mom leans her head against my shoulder. "Derek is planning to take him off the medication that's keeping him under so we can test his legs. Right now, he's responding to having his reflexes messed with so that's a good sign. At least that's what everyone keeps telling us."

"Is the bleeding -"

"It's cleared up. They'll probably keep him on blood thinners for a while, though. Just to play it safe."

"I'm sorry I did this." My hands shake so badly that Mom takes the tea from me, setting it in the floor. "I'm sorry I did this to him ... and to me. I just wasn't thinking."

"You were right when you said that we had to take this chance to help him, Callie," Mom says, taking my hand. "This surgery was the right thing to do. I couldn't live with myself if I didn't try to give him back what he lost in the ocean that day. Our hearts were in the right place with this."

"I feel so damn guilty," I confess.

"Don't feel guilty for Jasper. Feel guilty that you upset your father so badly that he was in tears. Feel guilty that Mark and Addison quarreled so badly that your daddy has left to drive her home."

"Where's Mark?"

"He stormed out of here after he argued with Erica about hitting you." Mom picks up my tea and hands it to me again. "What did she mean about her parents?"

I glance at her, wondering if she'll judge Erica even more harshly for who her parents were. "She was adopted by her aunt and uncle and they were drug addicts. Alcoholics, too. She was basically neglected and forced to live in ... one hell hole after another. They spent their food money on getting high and didn't give a rat's ass about her."

"And you went to Nebraska to visit these people?"

"We went to visit their grave, Mami. They died together after a cigarette caught their trailer on fire. I asked her to let me take her back there so she could put her past behind her." My voice breaks now and I start to cry again. "And now I've done the same thing to her that they did."

Mom pulls my head to her shoulder now. It's so far down that it strains my neck and I find myself missing the days that we were eye level. It's hard to be comforted by someone so much shorter than you. She rubs my wet hair and squeezes my hand. "She has no family?"

"She has me," I reply, sniffling. "I don't know how to fix this."

"Apologize." Mom rests her cheek on the top of my head. "She's downstairs warming up dinner for you. Why don't you go talk to her while I call Joel."

When Mom gives me a kiss on the forehead I close my eyes and let it work like a saving grace. It takes effort to get to my feet and go downstairs, but I do it. I find Erica sitting at the island in the kitchen flipping through paperwork. She looks up when she senses that I'm standing there and she has her glasses on again, perched low on her nose. Her blue eyes peer at me over the top of them, raking me from head to toe before she settles on my eyes. I try not to blink so that she can see that the only glassiness that remains in my eyes are unshed tears of bone crushing fear. She should tell me to leave. I wouldn't blame her if she did.

Maybe I should volunteer to leave.

Would she be relieved?

"You need to drink some water," Erica tells me before she turns back to her papers. "Your dinner is in the microwave."

I'm pretty sure that's her way of dismissing me, but I don't move. I can't move. "What are you doing?"

"Research. Webber wants me to try out a new imager that will let me see a heart differently."

"Do you want some help?"

"No." Erica pushes her glasses back up on her nose without glancing my way at all. "Are you going to eat or do you plan on going back to bed?"

I'm saved from answering by my mother's arrival. She smiles at me, scowls at Erica, and says, "Honey, your father's almost here to pick me up. We're staying at the Archfield to be closer to Jasper. Do you - would you like to come with us?"

Erica's giving me her full attention now. I watch her take her glasses off and set them aside and she turns a little on the stool to make it painfully obvious that she's waiting for my answer. I clear my throat and say, "Why would I go with you? I live here."

Mom touches my arm and then the alarm chimes to indicate that the gate is opening out front. My eyes are still on Erica's and she's not blinking. My mother heads back into the living room to let my father in so I seize the moment and say, "Do you want me to leave, Erica?"

"Do you want to leave?" she asks.

"No. I don't."

She shrugs her shoulders and goes back to her paperwork. A horn blows in front of the house and I make a face, going into the living room where my mother is gathering her purse. "Is that Dad? Why isn't he coming in?"

Shoving her leather bag over her shoulder, Mom takes my hand. "He doesn't want to talk to you tonight."

"What?" I start for the door, intent on going outside to speak with my father, but Mom catches my hand. "Mom, he's -"

"Let it be, honey." She pulls me into a hug, dropping a kiss on my cheek. "What you did ... well ... it's the last thing your daddy needed at the moment. He's not handling this thing with Jasper very well and he needed you. We both did ... to explain things, to help us understand the hospital jargon. You let him down and he doesn't want to talk to you until he's had a little more time to get over it."

"He can't just ignore me!" I cry.

"Isn't that what you've been doing the past couple of days? Ignoring everyone and everything?" Mom shakes her head. "If you need me then you call me and I'll be right here. I promise."

She leaves, glancing back at me before she shuts the door. I flop down on the sofa to keep from watching her leave. I can see the headlights of the rental car flash through the windows as my father turns it around and then there's nothing but silence. It's amazing what silence can do to you. I feel like I've been dropped in the middle of nowhere and I can't hear anything except my own desperation. I want to scream, I want to smash the crystal bowl on the coffee table, I want to do something, anything to shatter this hopeless quiet.

I don't know how long I sit there, but eventually I hear Erica push the stool back and the refrigerator door opens. A bottle of water appears in front of my face a second later and I take it, but don't open it.

"You're welcome," she says drily. "Are you going to drink it or look at it?"

"Are you going to forgive me at some point?"

"You've been up a couple of hours, Callie. You usually make me jump through hoops for days when I piss you off."

"You're stronger than me."

"No. I'm not. What you're feeling right now ... like the silence is going to eat you alive ... that's exactly how I feel when you refuse to talk to me." She slumps down on the couch beside me. "What you've done ... this hurt me more than I have ever been hurt in my life. You could have killed yourself and once again ... I'd lose the person I love, but this time ... it would be YOUR fault and YOUR doing and I'd spend the rest of my life trying to figure out how I failed YOU."

"You have never failed me."

"Then why -"

"I failed MYSELF!" I shout. "I'm the one who put Jasper on the fucking boat that day. I'm the one who MADE him go out when he didn't want to! I'm the one who told Joel to look behind us at Hope because it was so funny that she couldn't ski, but kept trying. It's MY fault! I did this to him! I should have died that day! They were so busy trying to stop the bleeding on me that no one jumped in for him fast enough! I should have died! If I had died then they would have left me alone and got him out of the water! It's MY FAULT! And now he could die and I did this, too!"

"Oh god, baby, you didn't -"

"I DID!" I'm crying now. I'm as close to being hysterical as I have ever been and now would be a great time for her to slap me again because I am going over the edge as fast as I can go. "And then I left him, Erica. I left him in the hospital and I went on with my life like I didn't take his! I went back to school and I forgot all about him! You're not the only one who didn't go back home! For TWO YEARS I refused to go back. I couldn't see him. It took hearing him eventually say my name on the phone to make me remember that he existed at ALL because I convinced myself that he died that day!"

"Listen to me -"

"I'm sorry!! I'm sorry that it hurts so much I'd rather sleep through it! He loved me and I - I took his life." I try to get to my feet because nothing would make me happier than running back to bed and hiding under the cover, but she won't let me. "Erica -"

"Stop." She pulls me back down beside her and wraps her arms around me. "This is why you fought so hard for this surgery. You wanted to give him back what you think you took from him."

I nod.

"Callie, accidents happen and that's all it was that day in the water. It was a horrible, devastating accident that you have no blame for. And it's okay that you went back to school when it was over and it's fine that you didn't go back home for a while." Her hand brushes my hair back so she can see the side of my face. "You did not die that day and you're supposed to keep living, even when it hurts so much that you don't want to. You HAVE to keep living. Look at me."

Lifting my head is physically painful, but I do it. She rubs my cheeks with both of her palms now and says, "When Rachel died ... I checked out for a while, too. I made it through her funeral and then I turned off the phones and stayed drunk for a week. It took me a week to realize that Rachel would want me to be happy and keep going. That's what Jazz wants for you, too. He's happy when you are and if he does die, which I don't think he will, then you have to live enough for the both of you. That's what I'm doing with you, Cal. I'm living so much that Rachel would be proud of me. Make Jazz proud of you, baby."

"What if he never comes back? What if he dies and -"

"It will be devastating if he dies. You will cry and mourn and never, ever forget him, but you don't get to give up. Because there are people who need you, who love you, and they'll be standing in line to pick you up every single time you fall." Her face clouds a little and tears fill her eyes. "You are stronger than this and it's high time you stop punishing yourself for something that happened fifteen years ago. Do you hear me?"

"I don't know how," I tell her, choking on the words. "Help me. Please?"

"Okay ... tomorrow you're going to go to the hospital and see your brother because he's probably going to wake up and look for you."

"No, I don't want -"

"You're going. You're not running out on him again because you'd regret it. And you're not going to hide behind a pain pill to do it. You will be there when they wake him up and if he can't walk again or if he can't speak ... you're going to make him feel like it's okay." She pulls me closer when I start to cry a little harder. "I'll be there with you. Whatever you can't handle ... I'll handle it for you."

"How?"

"Well, I get pretty high off you all the time. I'm pretty sure I can do the same for you."

I give her a watery smile and she returns it. "I really am sorry, Erica. I didn't even think about your parents when I -"

"I'm gonna let you have this one because you earned it." She leans forward and gives me a soft, sweet kiss. "But this is the only time I'll forgive you for abusing yourself like this. Are we clear?"

"Yeah. We're clear."

"I need you, Callie. I really need you more than you will ever know."

"I know. Believe me ... I know." I pull her against me, hugging her close. "Because I need you just as much."

"Will you please eat something now?"

I slide my hands over her back, then around her waist where I lift her shirt just enough to feel the soft skin of her belly. "Make me forget. Please, Erica. Just ... make me forget."

Her blue eyes are like prisms of light when she bites her bottom lip. I take her lack of response as a yes and tug her shirt up a little. I don't yank it off her. Instead, I move off the couch and kneel down, kissing every inch of her that I've exposed. I trace her ribs with my tongue, then do the same for her belly button. I take my time, losing myself in the taste, the texture, and the familiar, comforting scent of her that always drives me crazy. My hands mold around her waist, then slide behind her where I unfasten her bra. I feel her shift a little and glance up in time to see her pull her shirt over her head. Before she can slip her bra over her arms I do it for her, trailing my fingertips in its wake.

Her hands crash into my hair when I take one of her nipples into my mouth and one of her legs slide over my ass, pulling me a little closer. I'm already between her legs, but I yank her to the edge of the couch so her center can press against my waist as I attack her breasts again. "Slow down," she whispers, pulling my face up to hers.

When our mouths meet ... she sets a new pace. Her tongue slowly undulates against mine, making our racing hearts the only swiftly moving current between us. She doesn't break the kiss as she unbuttons my flannel pajamas and I didn't bother with a bra. She lets it fall over my arms and wraps her other leg around me and when she lifts her hips just a little, I can feel her heat against my stomach. Still kneeling in front of the couch, I'm at the perfect level to take full advantage of her chest, but she has other things in mind. "Stand up."

I oblige her and she peels my pants down, taking my panties with them. Now she's in a prime position and she doesn't squander the opportunity. With her face almost even with my sex, she slides a finger against me and leans down just a little to kiss the scar on my leg. I feel her tongue move over it and then against the crease of my leg where she follows it to downward until her tongue replaces her finger, open mouth kissing the slit that is currently aching beyond words.

I watch her every move, parting my legs just a little to give her more access, but she doesn't keep going. Instead, she rises to her feet and unbuttons her own pants. I watch her lower them and kick them aside before I reach for her. Standing face to face and chest to chest she kisses me again and our arms tangle and we cling to one another. When she slips her hands over the globes of my ass, kneading and stroking, I whisper her name and she responds by whispering that she loves me.

That's all I needed to hear.

The only thing that matters in this moment is how well we fit together.

I fall under her spell and I don't even realize that she's maneuvered us into the kitchen until I feel the table against my backside and she urges me onto it. I sit down on the edge and my legs wind around her as she kisses me, then moves to my neck. Taking her time, she skims down my body and the lower she goes ... the lower I go until I'm finally lying on my back and she's sucking at the flesh over my pelvic bone.

She's better than any drug that could erase my pain.

I can't think at all when she rubs her tongue over the place where I most want it. She circles my clit, nipping, sucking, bathing and rubbing. I grip the edge of the table and push up against her face and the new angle gives her just enough of what she needs to insert one finger, then two into my starving flesh. She finds a rhythm and pumps her hand, curling her fingers up against my g-spot. I can feel the ends of her curly hair brushing against the insides of my thighs and the front of it has fallen against my lower belly where is feels like a feather against me. My senses come undone and I've never felt more alive than I do when she reels me in with her tongue and I come harder than I think I ever have.

When she kisses her way back up my body ... I rise with her and by the time she kisses my mouth ... I'm moderately under control. I can feel her hands on my lower back and I don't object when she invites me off the table. But I refuse to wait for whatever destination she has in mind. It takes no coaxing on my part because when I kneel in the floor and pull her leg over my shoulder she doesn't object for a second. As a matter of fact, she brushes her fingers through the top of my hair and grips it, tugging my face back and forth over her as she rides it. She's wet, she's trembling, and she's actually begging for me to open my mouth.

I smile and do just that.

I don't have to do much work though. She does it for me, making great use of my chin and tongue ... even my teeth.

When she gets off, she leans back against the wall and I enjoy the view. She looks wanton with her hair mussed and her nipples standing up in tumescent peaks. I draw the back of my hand over my face because let's face it ... she was wet and ready for me ... and use her hips for balance as I get to my feet. She rubs her nose against mine and then hugs me. Using her foot, she pulls out one of the chairs at the table that she just devoured me on and points at it. "You're eating dinner."

"I just did."

She smacks my backside and retrieves the bottle of water we left in the living room. I drain half of it while she heats the food in the microwave again. It's very, very erotic to watch someone cook while their naked ... even if the cooking is really only nuking something. When she takes out the plate and brings it to me ... I make a mental note to ban all clothing in our house. She sits next to me, hands me a fork and I take it, digging into the casserole thing my mother concocted.

Erica rests her chin in her palm while I eat and I have the sinking suspicion that she's about to say something big.

My fears are confirmed when she clears her throat.

I put the fork down and give her my full attention. "What?"

"A lot happened while you were in your drug induced coma."

"Like what?"

"Izzie Stevens had a miscarriage."

"Oh my god!"

"That's why I was called in today. That's why I had to leave you. Not that you noticed. You slept through it."

I ignore the barb. "What happened to her?"

"Car accident. Her airbag didn't work properly and she hit the steering wheel. I had to go in and see how badly her heart was damaged."

"Is she -"

"She's okay. Collapsed lung, bruised heart, and a few broken ribs." Erica takes my bottle of water and sips it. "Addison was working on her for a couple of hours. She - well - she had to perform a full hysterectomy."

"Jesus."

"Yeah." Erica nods. "And that's not all."

"No?"

"Alex Karev was with her and ... he didn't make it."

"Karev is dead?" I'm shell shocked. I'm in utter disbelief.

Erica nods. "I was there when Sloan called it. Did you know that Addison slept with Karev?"

"Yeah, I did."

"Mark didn't. He was stunned by Addison's reaction and then we came here and he found out what she had prescribed you and ... well, he basically told her that it was over between them."

It's amazing what can happen in the blink of an eye.

The revolving door of life goes around and around until death reaches in and pulls someone out.

Izzie Stevens has lost her friend. She has lost her baby. She has lost her ability to give life.

No matter what happens with Jasper tomorrow when they wake him up ... I can still wrap my arms around him. I can still feel his breath against my neck and see his eyes light up.

Jazz hasn't gone away.

And I'll fight hard enough for him to keep him in that revolving door with me.

We'll keep spinning ... around and around and around ... because death passed him by this time for a reason.


	32. Chapter 32

I don't ask for my rings again because I know that the line I crossed is one that I can't just apologize for. That line is always going to be there, leaving visible marks on the both of us. Erica doesn't mention the pills again as we get ready for bed and when I settle into her arms, I'm shaking. I was that terrified that I'd never be in this spot again. And I know that I don't have a right to be here with her after everything I've put her through. She's far kinder to me than I deserve. What I did ... there's really no way to apologize enough and there's no amount of forgiveness in the world that could wash it away. It's dark in our bedroom, pitch black and just cool enough to make her body feel like a respite in a raging ice storm. I shiver a little and Erica puts her leg over mine. It gives me something to do ... it gives me something to hang on to as I trace lazy patterns over her knee.

"You're not sleepy at all, are you?" She doesn't wait for me to answer her. "I don't see how you could be since you've slept like the dead for two days."

"Am I ever going to be able to live this down?"

"The shelf life on something like this is infinite. I may bring it up when we're ninety if you piss me off good enough."

"When I'm ninety, you'll be ninety seven and probably forgetful so I'm not too concerned."

"I'll never be forgetful, Cal."

"You'll want to be," I tell her. "There are some things you spend your whole life wishing you could forget."

I keep sliding my fingers over her skin and she pulls me a little closer. I think maybe Erica has gone to sleep, but she says, "Tell me about that day with Jasper. Tell me about the crash." She puts her hand on mine, stilling it. "Or tell me something else ... something that I don't know about him. Tell me about what he was like when he was younger."

It feels like someone with a heavy boot steps down on my chest and closes off my airway. Speaking about Jasper is not the same as thinking about him. Every day that passes conjures a new memory in my head of him. I can remember his first haircut and the way Mom scooped up his brown curls and cried. I know that his favorite toy for the longest time was a stuffed horse that he called 'Hoey because he couldn't say horsey. He used to curl up with a nonexistent stomachache when Mom would suggest taking him to bible school. If my dad whipped up his famous Key Lime Pie ... it would vanish and we'd find the empty pie pan weeks later buried in the sand or folded into the gutter of the house. I know that he asked me to pull out his front tooth when it was loose and then gave me the money that the tooth fairy left him because I did all the work. And I can remember finger painting with him when he was four and I was fourteen and listening to him laugh made up for the fact that he was all that there was of my social life.

How do I describe a perfect, beautiful soul like that? Can I choke out the words at all? What if I mess up and mention him in the past tense? Will that make it so? If I paint the picture of him wrong ... will he come back wrong? At all? "I don't - I think we should talk about something else."

She pulls me just a little closer with her leg. "Then tell me about you. Tell me what it was like for you after it happened."

I don't have to close my eyes because the room is dark enough to let me envision it so clearly in my head that it's like watching a movie. Taking a deep breath, I say, "I'd rather tell you what it was like before."

"I'm all ears."

I don't know how long I talk, but I tell her everything that has ever haunted me, everything that I've ever felt piercing my heart. I tell her about the Walk Man Jasper broke and the way I shoved him down. I tell her about losing him once at the mall and how he said it was okay because he knew I'd always find him. Every story, every tale, every laugh and heartache becomes something that I give to her. She listens without interrupting as I talk about Saturday morning cartoons and building forts in our backyard. I laugh my way through the Bill Clinton bumper stickers that we wallpapered my mother's bathroom with and cry my way through my prom night. I go on and on until I finally reach the end ... I've exhausted my mental memory bank and the smiling, ten year old baby face of my brother is extinguished like a candle. I even hear it hiss as it fades away. As much as I miss the image ... what I see now is Jasper as a man.

I think maybe ... maybe I've let go of the child.

Erica is silent for a while, but I know I haven't bored her to sleep because her fingers have not stopped threading through my hair once. "I understand it now," she finally says. "I get it, baby."

"Which part?"

"Why you'd do anything in the world to bring him back. All those memories and that spark he had as a child was beautiful. You miss that. And this stranger that wears his face isn't the same." She rubs my neck now. "I'm sorry if my opinion on his surgery added to any of the guilt you feel. I never knew ... I just didn't think that you were so close. The age difference made me think that -"

"He was my first best friend. My only friend. He was never just my kid brother, Erica. He was my world." I don't want to cry anymore, but the dam bursts under the pressure of my agony and I feel hot tears spill over my face and onto her shoulder. "He shouldn't have been on the boat that day."

"You didn't force him to go with you. He could have stayed home, Cal. He wanted to be with you because ... well, you were his best friend, too. No matter what else happened that day on the boat, the two of you were there together and that's where you were happiest. That's where HE was happiest."

"I just want him to come back. I just want him back," I sob. "I want him to be who he was so that he can understand me when I tell him I'm sorry. He loved me. He loved me with all of his heart and I wasn't worth it. I'm still not worth it."

Erica catches me as I start to climb out of the bed and pulls me back against her. She waits for me to regain some semblance of control over myself and says, "You're wrong. You are worth it. Why do you think I keep holding on with both hands even when you do your best to kill me? It's because that part of you that Jasper believed in so much is still there, Callie, and I'm the believer now. You didn't change that day in the water and what happened was NOT your fault. You have to let that go so that you can love yourself as much as he does ... and as much I do."

"How? I don't know how!"

"Let me show you."

When she gently moves around me and pushes me back against the bed ... I know that she's going to love my tears away.

And I open my arms, believing with everything inside me that she can thaw the guilt with her warmth and keep me afloat in the massive ocean of doubt I've frozen in for fifteen years.

I'm dreaming of Italy again.

Angie and Claudine are so young and beautiful that they run circles around me as I try to catch them in the sunflower field. Erica is holding my hand as we scour every inch and we can hear the other two women laughing gaily as we fumble along. It's exhilarating. It's enchanting. And then Jasper pops up in front of us and says, "I found them, Callie! Hey, Yellow, look behind you!"

And when we turn to look, Alex Karev is wearing a smirk on his face as he waves to us and slowly vanishes. Here and gone in an instant.

We're all just here and gone in an instant.

The phone rings, slicing the dream to tatters and I reach for it, stretching across Erica. She's got her pillow over her head and is flat on her back. Even though it's an ungodly hour and the news could be devastating, I still take a moment to relish the way her breasts feel against mine. Hey, she did tell me to live life to the fullest and forgive myself. Her flesh against mine feels like redemption if you ask me.

"Hello?"

"Calliope?"

"Hi, Mom."

"I wanted to call and prepare you -"

"What happened?!" I sit up fast, yanking the cover with me and Erica pops up behind me, her hand moving protectively around my waist. "Is Jasper -"

"He's fine," Mom replies. "But Joel is on a flight out here and he's even angrier at you than your daddy so you better get ready to hear a sermon. He wants to ship you off to Betty Ford or drown you in a toilet, which I'd prefer since it's cheaper."

"Oh fuuuuuck," I whine, rubbing my forehead. I just know I'll have a migraine before the day is over. And Erica will break my arm and beat me with it if I take so much as a Tylenol. "Why is he coming?"

"Unlike you, precious, he actually wants to be a part of the family during this troubling time. And if you say that word to me again I'll smack your mouth like Erica did."

"Ouch."

"His flight will arrive at eleven this morning. Can you pick him up at the airport and bring him to the hospital?"

This is my mother's way of making sure that I'm coming. "Yeah, okay. What time are they waking Jazz up?"

"Derek said after lunch. There's a viewing at the funeral home for that handsome young doctor who passed away and several of the staff will be there for that." Mom clears her throat. "Are you and Erica -"

"We're fine."

"You swear to me that she's not violent with you?"

"Only when I ask her to be."

"Is that a sexual reference?"

"Yes."

Silence.

"Mom?"

"That's not funny, Callie. You swear to me that she's -"

"I swear she's not a wife beater."

"You're not her wife."

"Yet."

She sighs and gives me Joel's flight information. I hang up and look at Erica, who has her chin propped on her fist. "Good morning, Yellow."

"Your mother thinks I'm a wife beater," Erica says, looking miserable. "I shouldn't have ... well, no ... I should have slapped you, but maybe not in front of everyone. Are you okay? It doesn't hurt does it?"

"You slap like a girl."

Her eyes meet mine and she smiles. "You like that I'm a girl."

"No ... I like that you're a woman." I scoot a little closer to her and kiss her neck. "And that you're the kind of woman who has no problem slapping me in front of everyone when I'm so far out of my head that I need it."

"So, what did Lori Anne want?"

I let her change the subject. I'm pretty sure that the slap that isn't still hurting me is killing her. "Joel's coming. We have to pick him up at eleven. He's mad at me because of the pain pills so it's probably a good thing that you took my rings away from me because he'll freak out when he -"

"Are you going to look down at your hand at some point?"

I gasp and do just that. My rings are firmly back in place. Just like she did in Italy, she slipped them on while I was sleeping. I run my thumb over the yellow diamond that makes me feel so proud and blessed to be loved by her, then burst into tears. It came too close this time. We almost went our separate ways and that's not a way that I'd ever willingly go. There's some chemical in my body that puts me on whatever path she's on and I can't really exist off it.

Erica puts her arms around me, kissing my shoulder, then my cheek. "Aww, baby, don't cry. You knew I'd give them back."

"No. No, I didn't."

"Well, now you do."

"I don't deserve it," I tell her, rubbing my aching eyes. I can't cry anymore ... my eyes literally feel like they'll never NOT throb. "I spent months dreaming of what it would be like to finally have you. What we have together is everything I've ever wanted. It's better than I ever dreamed it could be and I can't stop making a mess out of us. And I don't know HOW you keep forgiving me because I never make it easy for you."

"I have faith that you're going to GET it one day."

"Get what?"

"How relationships work. You can't expect me to keep trying to teach you, Callie. There has to come a point where your first instinct is to run TO me instead of AWAY from me." She kisses my shoulder again. "And I know that when that time comes ... we will be perfectly fine from there on out."

"From here on out," I correct her. "I've never been in a relationship that lasted this long and you have. So you do have a lot to teach me, but I learn fast. And I want to learn, Yellow. I want to learn how to make you feel the way you always make me feel because ... it's amazing."

"The only thing you need to learn is that everything you do affects me. So keep that in mind. You could have overdosed and I could have found you lying here ... gone. So the next time you want to do something so completely fucking stupid, you think about how it would affect me and if you love me like you say you do ... then you won't hesitate to change your mind." She reaches up and touches my face, then trails her thumb over my bottom lip. "And I have to learn that it's okay to hurt your feelings sometimes, even though it kills me, because there are times that you need to hear the truth. I'm not going to bite my tongue anymore. I asked you in Italy to stand up to me and to not let me walk all over you and I'm going to take my own advice. I love you. I love you more than anything in this world, but I'm not going to lie down and let you walk on me either."

"I don't want you to let me. I want you to stand up to me." I give her a small grin. "Because you're pretty sexy when you're all badass and in my face."

"You're pretty sexy when your mouth falls open in shock, too."

"Thank you. I think."

"We should get up and get dressed. I'd like to stop by the florist and pick up some flowers for Dr. Karev. We need to go to the funeral home, too. He'll only be in Seattle for a couple of days and then his family is taking him back to Iowa."

"I still can't believe that he's dead."

"It happens when you least expect it, Lee. It happens in the blink of an eye and that's why I want you to never take your life for granted again. Deal?" She looks at me in confusion. "Why are you grinning ear to ear? I'm serious!"

"You called me 'Lee'. That's what Jazz calls me."

"You call me Yellow. And that's what Jazz calls me."

"I love you."

She smiles just as big as I am. "I love you, too."

We both go into the closet and dig through our clothing until we find something suitable to wear. I choose a black dress with long sleeves and a rounded collar. It's modest and simple, but the way Erica looks at me in it makes me think it could be more. She dons a black suit and puts a red shirt under it ... one of the ones I picked out for her at the mall. I adjust her collar and kiss her before I tame my flyaway curls into a conservative twist and she does the same with her own hair, pinning it up so that a few tendrils curve around her face. I like it. It makes her neck look sinfully long.

It strikes me as I'm rooting around in the jewelry box for earrings that this could be Jasper's funeral we're dressing for.

And that somewhere in Iowa, Alex Karev's family is enduring the gut twisting pain that I've been fearing for weeks.

I didn't know Alex that well, but what I did know of him was nice enough. The day after George kicked me out of Meredith's house, Alex bought me coffee and encouraged me to call George every name in the book. Then he covered all the ones that I left out. I'll miss him. I'll miss seeing him swagger down the hallway with his cocky, confident air. I can tell that it's going to be one of those days where I cry at Hallmark commercials or because I see a stray dog begging for food so I don't bother with eye makeup. Actually, I don't bother with anything other than a little lip gloss and blush. Erica takes the same approach and I doubt she'll cry over Alex, but if I crumble for Jasper ... Erica will crumble right along with me.

At the florist, we choose a masculine looking standing spray that has plenty of blue flowers that matched Alex's scrubs and then we drive to the Gellar Memorial Center. Coworkers are everywhere. I sign the book for both Erica and myself (I've already faced the fact that her penmanship is horrific) and then she takes my hand as we speak softly to a few of our colleagues. The coffin at the front of the room is solid black with shiny silver handles. The large flower arrangement on top of it is red and white and as we gravitate closer to it ... I realize that the cloying smell of flowers makes me sick at my stomach. It reeks of death. It drives home the fact that nothing lasts forever. These flowers will die the same way that Alex Karev died and my heart aches for the people that he touched ... and the people that he will never touch again.

Izzie's face flashes through my head.

I see Cristina sitting between Meredith and George.

I've never seen Yang cry.

Until right now.

She's outright sobbing and no one is comforting her.

I think they're all as shocked as I am.

I pick up a box of fresh tissue and kneel down in front of her, my hand on her knee. Meredith takes a few sheets of Kleenex and gives me something she means as a smile, but it's really just a grimace of pain that shows a few of her teeth. Yang leans forward and hugs me and I cling to her, shocked at how small and fragile she feels. I'm used to Erica, who exudes strength in every embrace. Yang sniffles and says, "I worked on him. I - I tried everything I could."

"I'm sure you did," I tell her, rubbing her back. "You're the best, you know? I'm so sorry."

Meredith sobs beside us and I take her hand. She squeezes it tightly in her own. "He was a great man," Grey says. "And - and Izzie can't be here for it. She doesn't even know that he's gone yet. We haven't told her because she's already so devastated about the baby and about her -- God, she should have been here for this. Alex would have wanted her here."

I feel the center of my heart shatter.

Alex probably wanted so much.

Cristina lets me go and noisily blows her nose. "I hate this. I hate it. It's so stupid to sign a book and listen to the piano player keep playing the same dumb shit over and over again. It's barbaric and it's not right. We sit here looking at Alex in death and no one really saw him in life except for Izzie. And she's not here to see him on his way out. I - I need air."

She leaps to her feet and Meredith goes after her, leaving me alone with George. I sit down on the pew beside him and he takes my left hand, patting it. I don't need comfort. I'm not torn apart, but maybe he needs to think that he's helping me. "He was almost the heart in the elevator guy," he says, absently stroking my diamond ring. "Burke wanted him to do it ... not me. You - you always said that me being the heart in the elevator guy is the reason you wanted to date me at first. It was almost Alex."

I sit completely still as George tells me about Alex's lack of fishing skill and about the way Alex once hugged him for saving Joe's life. Then he stops talking and we spend a while gazing at the coffin the same way we did at his father's funeral. George held my hand so tightly then that it ached for two days and when he broke down and sobbed ... it was my shoulder that he leaned on and my name that he cried out as they shut Harold's coffin for the last time. He said it like a prayer, like a silent plea for me to make the pain go away. And I tried. God, how I tried. I glance up when Lexie appears and she's obviously been in the bathroom crying. The top of her hair is a little wet, probably from splashing water on her face. I pat George on the shoulder and stand up, hugging her.

Everyone feels so FRAGILE.

I'm so glad that Erica feels sturdy in my arms.

I can lean and she can hold me up. And I'd like to think that I'm just as strong for her when she needs me.

When Erica appears a second later ... we walk to the coffin together and gaze down at Alex Karev's body. I never noticed that he had a mole on his cheek. I never noticed that his lips were kind of perfect or that his right hand had a jagged scar. You can see someone everyday and never really see them, but looking at them the last time makes you soak up every detail. What a sad, sad realization. In life, Karev was cocky, charming, brazen and bold. In death, he looks like a little boy who grew up too fast. And lost too soon.

He's nothing but a bruised, broken, overly made up little boy.

I once told Addison that he was the type to settle down one day and teach his kids to play football.

His big hands will never hold a football again ... much less his own baby.

He deserved to do at least that much before he died.

Erica has her arm around me as we gaze down at what remains of a doctor who had all the potential in the world. She leans close to me and says, "When I realized what you had done ... with the pills ... this is the image that went through my head. I saw you like this. You could have been like this."

"I can't keep apologizing, Erica. Please just stop."

"Do you see Jasper when you look at him?"

"Yeah."

"Does it hurt?"

"Yes, it does."

"Please ... never make me see you like this again."

"I won't. I promise ... I won't."

I hold myself together until someone steps up to my right and Addison says, "It doesn't even look like him. He's orange. Why would they make him orange?"

It's because the damage was extensive, but I don't need to tell her that. And she only asked it because asking why he's dead makes even less sense. We all do a tango with death every single time we step into the operating room. Death stands right behind us, breathing down our necks, waiting for us to make a mistake. "I don't know. Addison, I just don't know."

We turn toward each other at the same time and her anger at me over the pills is pushed aside because she readily comes into my arms and her slender shoulders tremble as she breaks down. Alex was not just a one night stand for Addison Montgomery. She confided to me just before she moved to California that if he had wanted more from her ... she would have freely given it. To mourn for what might have been is devastating when you know that it absolutely will never be. I stand back a little as Erica and Addison embrace and I don't cry until Addison reaches into the coffin and adjusts Alex's tie, then runs her hand over his short hair. She rests her chin on the mouth of the coffin, gazing down at him like she's willing him to wake up, to see her, to hear her. Her tears fall on his jacket, leaving it spotted as she leans forward, kisses his head, and says, "You were the best god damned intern I ever had, Alex Karev."

I learn something as I watch Addison.

I learn that there's no room for what might have been in a person's life.

If you want it ... go after it.

Because dying with regrets ... or even being left to live with them ... is a sad, sad way to be.

I invite Addison to go to the airport with us because she's in no shape to drive and she eventually relents. If I'm being honest, I invite her because I think her presence will keep Joel off my ass, but I also want to be there for her. I start to rethink that decision when Erica pulls onto the main road and Addison collects herself enough to yell at me. Her tirade lasts until we're at the airport and continues until we walk inside. It's vicious. She doesn't pull any punches as she tells me exactly what she thinks of my 'stunt' and the fact that I bailed on my family. The only reason she stops brow beating me is because she drops an f-bomb near a toddler who loudly repeats it and the kid's mother looks fit to be tied.

When we sit down to wait for the plane, Addison says, "I can't believe you did that, Callie. You took the coward's way out and you're not a coward. At least I didn't think you were."

"I know. I'm sorry."

"I don't care if you come to me with your womb dangling out your ass ... I will never write you a prescription for anything again. Even if I cause it."

"If my womb comes out my ass ... you can rake in the millions of dollars from the publicity and own the right for the made for television movie that would undoubtedly happen."

"This is not funny. You could have died." Addison's voice falters over that last word and she frantically digs through her purse for tissue. Erica comes to the rescue and Addy dabs at her eyes before she speaks again. "Mark broke up with me."

"I heard," I tell her, putting my arm around her. "I can talk to him if you want me to."

She shreds the tissue in her hand and says, "I need to tell you something and I swear to God you better not say one word to anyone."

"Okay."

"Erica?" Addison asks.

"I won't say a thing," Erica agrees.

"I think I'm pregnant. And so help me God ... if I am ... I'm flying to California to kick Naomi's ass because she told me that it couldn't happen. My period is late and I'm sick as hell every morning and I can't keep telling myself that it's stress."

"Does Mark know?" I push her hair back. "Addy?"

"Mark doesn't know. And if I tell him and we get back together I'll always wonder if he only took me back because of the baby."

"On the other hand," I say, "you will start to show and he will figure it out. Do you really want to piss him off even more?"

"I could go back to California."

Any desire I have to comfort her flies out of me like it's been summoned by God himself. "You're kidding right?"

"Naomi said I could."

"Addison!" I angrily jump to my feet. "You cannot do this to him again! Not after what you did in New York! To this day ... whenever he buys a new calendar he circles three dates. The day you told him, the baby's due date, and the day you ended it. Don't you dare think about taking his child to California ... HIS CHILD, ADDY, and not tell him!"

"Don't you judge me, Torres!" Addison snaps, mopping at her face with another tissue. "You're not a fucking saint!"

"I wouldn't keep a baby from its father!"

"I'm not sure that it's Mark's baby, Callie." She is crying so hard now that people are starting to look. "Alex and I ... we had sex."

My bottom jaw drops and I know that my eyes look like saucers. "You told me you didn't sleep with Alex that night!"

"I didn't ... that night. It just ... it happened and I won't know for sure until I get a good look at the fetus and can figure out a due date."

"OH MY GOD! How could you - what were you thinking?! You came to Miami and told me you were in love with Mark! You came back HERE to have a chance with him and you did THIS?!"

"YOU DID THE SAME THING!" Addison yells.

"NO! I DID NOT!"

"Callie," Erica snaps, shaking her head at me. "Now is really not the time for this! Leave her alone!"

Addison is hysterical now and Erica moves into the seat that I vacated to comfort her. I leave them there and stalk through the throng of travelers while my mind spins out of control. Addison slept with Alex. Mark has no clue. The thought of him being hurt all over again grips my soul in a vise. There are times that I can actually live with what I did to him because I know he's better off without me than having half of me ... but I can't handle knowing something THIS HUGE when he doesn't. I'm ready to send Joel a text message telling him to take a cab when I hear, "AUNT COW-LIE!"

I turn just in time to catch my nephew who is running toward me at breakneck speed. I lift him up and he wraps his skinny arms around me so tightly that he damn near crushes my larynx. I tickle him to make him back off a little and he retaliates by planting a wet kiss on my cheek. "Hey, Trevor. I didn't know you were coming, too."

"Mommy and Savvy stay home," he tells me, stroking my hoop earring. "Savvy gots school, but I wanna see Jazzy. Where Jazzy?"

"Jazz is in the hospital. We'll see him soon, okay?"

"Okay. You carry me? I tired." To prove his point, he yawns and puts his head on my shoulder. There's something that feels just right about a little kid in my arms. I felt it with Jazz when he was younger. I felt it with Emma Foster. And I feel it now with Trevor. Something happens in my gut when I cradle a tiny life against me and I don't think I'll ever be able to explain it. Or get enough of it.

Joel arrives a second later looking haggard and wrinkled. He kisses my forehead and says, "Me and you? We're going to have a huge f.i.g.h.t. and you will wear the b.r.u.i.s.e.s. for a month. What in the h.e.l.l. were you thinking?"

"S.h.u.t. up," I reply. "Or I will b.r.e.a.k. your face."

"I'm gonna learn to spell real soon!" Trevor announces sleepily. "Then you can't do that no more."

I grin and Joel grins back, then takes my left hand and looks at my ring. "You are c.r.a.z.y. and still a p.e.r.v.e.r.t., Callie."

"And you are still a pain in the a.s.s., Joel. So we're even." I make a face at him and carry Trevor back toward Erica and Addison. "Try to be on your best behavior. Addison is with us and she lost a friend of hers yesterday in a car accident. He was a coworker of ours. A surgical resident."

"I'm sorry to hear that." His hand goes to my back, where he pats it in an uncharacteristic attempt to console me. "And I'll be good. I'll even speak to your partner in s.i.n. and refrain from reminding either of you that the Bible is pretty cut and dried on what you're doing."

"If you value your l.i.f.e then keep it that way. I mean it."

Erica spots us first and is as shocked as I am to see that Trevor has come along for the trip. He won't be allowed in the intensive care unit until I plead with Webber, but I really don't know if I want him to see Jasper. Not until we know for sure one way or the other. Trevor pretends to be bashful when Erica greets him and Joel pretends to be nice as he foregoes shaking her hand in favor of giving her a stiff, one armed hug. He does the same to Addison and apologizes for her loss, then we head out into what is shaping up to be an unseasonably cold day. My bare legs are covered with goose bumps as I lift Trevor into the backseat of my SUV and I watch Addison buckle him into the seat belt, making a mental note to buy him a car seat of some kind.

I have to smile a little at the thought of buying a car seat. And then the smile fades when I realize that there's a part of me that's more than a little jealous that Addison is pregnant. If I had never met Erica Hahn and if my heart didn't rest solely and firmly with her where it belongs and always will ... I would have probably been engaged to Mark right now. And I would have probably been carrying his child already because I buck convention at every turn. I glance in the backseat to check on Trevor and watch Addison play with him. She catches my eye and holds it for a second and I know in my soul that she's terrified. She could be carrying a dead man's child ... and the living guy that she's in love with could reject her for good. I can't be mad at her. I can't even pretend to be mad at her.

Addison's life is making mine look perfect.

We have to run the heat on the way to the hospital and I fear that the cold is a bad omen.

Maybe God is already chilling me to the bone so that I'll be prepared for what's coming.

There's a wreath of black roses in the lobby of the hospital and a blown up photo of Alex is in the middle of it. Addison puts a hand over her mouth and rushes into the bathroom. There's a guestbook here as well and page after page has been filled with well wishes. I see that there's a collection of money being taken in a large glass jar so I open my wallet and put all the cash I have on me inside. I have the distinct impression that Alex didn't come from money and his funeral fees will not be cheap. Erica follows suit, dropping in a few twenties and little Trevor digs in his pockets, holding up two quarters. I pick him up so he can drop it inside and explain to him that they money will help a nice doctor go home and rest in peace.

Hospitals deal in death as much as they deal in life. It's a roll of the dice and outcomes can go either way, but when one of your own has been taken so abruptly it causes a pall to descend over everyone. There's no hustle and bustle now. All the doctors, nurses, interns, and orderlies that I see are trudging back and forth, dragging their feet as they go about their duties. I hope that wherever Alex is ... he can see that his life, however short it was, has left an impact here at Seattle Grace. I know that I'll remember him for the rest of my days.

Addison comes back and I hug her, whispering that it's okay. I also tell her that I love her and I'm here, I'm not going anywhere. She gives me a watery smile and kisses my cheek. I begin to sweat as we board the elevator and pull my coat off. Erica takes it from me and lets it rest over her arm. As we descend higher and higher and closer and closer to Jazz ... I start to cry. It scares Trevor and Joel picks him up, giving me a sympathetic look as he rubs his baby on the back and tells him that it's okay. Erica hugs me and promises that it will be okay and I want to believe her; I want to believe that she can work whatever magic she has worked on me a million times, but I'm not convinced.

"Honey," she says softly, when my breathing hitches, "you need to calm down. It's going to upset everyone ... especially Jasper when he wakes up if they see you like this."

The doors open and I stumble in my heels. "I want to change clothes. I'm not comfortable."

Erica glances at Joel. "They're in room five seventeen. Can you tell them we'll be there in a few minutes?"

"Sure," Joel adjusts Trevor on his shoulder and pats my cheek. "Have a little faith, kiddo. For me?"

"I can watch him if you want," Addison tells Joel, holding out her arms for Trevor. "I don't think they'll let him go back and well ... I happen to know where they hide the candy in this place."

Trevor is sold on 'candy' and practically jumps into Addison's arms. I can hear her talking to him as she walks down the hall with him. He waves back at us the same way that Jasper waved over the back of the stretcher that took him to surgery.

In the locker room I find a pair of scrubs and pull them on. I choose them over the jeans and sweatshirt that I keep for emergencies. I feel stronger in my scrubs, like I can pull from some untapped physician reserve now that I'm in the costume. I want to be strong. I want to feel invincible. Erica puts both of our purses in my locker and starts to close it, but I stop her and pluck a photo of Jasper from his last birthday party off the inside of the door. He's smiling so beautifully, so innocently and handsomely that I have to sit down because I may never see that smile again. Erica straddles the bench and pulls me against her, not speaking. She doesn't have to speak for me to hear her loud and clear.

We're in this together and she's going to stick by my side for as long as I need her.

That will be for the rest of my life.

It takes more than a few minutes for my tears to eventually subside. The longer I look at the photo of Jazz, standing in the sunlight with his hand on the horse he enjoyed so much, the more I remember how strong he is. This was the same day that he barged into the living room and threw a tantrum because we were all yelling at one another. Jasper Torres is strong as HELL, I think. And he will unleash that temper again to come back to us. I have to believe that. I sniffle and lift my head off Erica chest and nod. "I'm ready."

"So am I."

Derek is standing outside Jasper's door when we walk down the hallway. He smiles at me, but it's fake. I know it's fake and I know that his 'cautious optimism' is about to be tested in front of all of us. "How are you, Callie?" he asks.

"I don't know," I reply honestly. "Ask me again when Jazz wakes up."

He squeezes my shoulder. "I stopped the medication about an hour ago. He should be coming around any time now. Why don't you go ahead inside?"

I've gone in and out of rooms all over the hospital, but I've never felt like walking into one could kill me. This one does. It takes Erica's persistent hand on my back to make me take a step forward, but I only take one step. She finally moves around me, opens the door, and pulls me along in her wake. My mother stands up and greets me, pulling me into a hug. I purposely avoid looking at Jasper and focus on my father, who turns his back to me and looks out the window instead. Joel is giving me the same look he used to give me when we were younger and I was about to be yelled at for something he probably caused. He's smug.

"Jazz has been making a few sounds now," Mom says, patting my cheek. "I like your hair, honey."

I nod at her and glance at Erica, who moves around me and goes to the bed where Jasper is lying. I still haven't looked at him. I watch her take a stethoscope and put it on, but that's the best I can do. She's doing an exam for my benefit ... or maybe for hers and I can't watch. Because if there's something wrong then I'll see it in her face and I'd rather be oblivious for as long as I can be. There's nothing but silence as Erica rustles around behind me and Mom finally asks, "What do you think, Erica?"

"Everything looks great and he definitely doesn't care for a sternum rub."

"Don't do that!" I say, turning around to look at her. "It'll hurt him and -"

There he is.

His head has been shaved and his face is pale, but he's still Jasper. He's still my Jazz. There is an oxygen tube up his nose and I can see the wiring from the heart monitor, but I can also see his full lips that are so much like mine. I can see the strong angle of his jaw and the eyelashes that I have always envied. I can see the faint trace of a closed up hole in his ear that I put there and then got a spanking for even though he asked me for it. His features may have matured, but he's still my baby brother.

He's not dead. He's just sleeping.

And I want him to wake up.

It feels like Saturday morning and he's missing our cartoons.

He's missing our LIVES.

I don't realize that I'm gripping the bed rail until his hand moves. It's just the briefest fluttering of his index finger and it could be nothing more than a muscle spasm, but it could also be him attempting to claw his way out of the darkness. I let the rail down and grip that hand, squeezing it tightly in my own, ready to pull him out or dive into the darkness with him. He said he wanted to be my big brother one day and that's what he is now ... his hand is large and soft and wonderful in mine. "Jazz? Jasper, wake up, buddy."

A wrinkle appears between his eyes and disappears just as quickly, making me wonder if I really saw it ... or I wanted to see it. I listen to the steady beat of his heart telling me that he's hanging on and I reach out, touching his cheek. He's warm and full of life. I can feel it. Jasper is NOT in a coffin. Jasper is NOT orange from too much makeup covering any injury. The scar on his head ... that will fade one day and all I want to see ... the only thing that would make this moment perfect ... would be to gaze into his eyes and have him recognize me.

His finger flutters again and my heart stops in my chest. Oh my god ... did he just squeeze my hand? Yes ... yes. He definitely did. Everything falls away around me and it's just me and Jasper and we're winning a tug of war that we didn't even know we were playing. We're chasing dolphins and racing the wind and he's laughing as I splash him with water. I see him as a baby, I see him taking his first steps, I hear him say my name for the first time and remember the way his small fingers clasped mine as we waited for the school bus together for the first time. I think maybe he feels it too ... he feels how much I need him right now. His breathing changes a little and I lean down, my mouth against his ear. What I say is for him only as I whisper, "I'm really sorry I pushed you down when you broke my Walk Man. And prom night is still the best night of my life. And ... I should have taken you to the skate park instead of out of the boat. You're still my best friend, buddy. Please come back to me. There's so much that we still have to do, Jazz. Wake up. Please wake up and talk to me."

Someone is crying behind me and I can't turn around to see who it is. I whisper promise after promise, telling my brother that I'll find a way to rip the moon out of the sky if he will just open his eyes. My tears drop against his cheek, bathing him in my pain, and I'm ready to shake him when his fingers grip my hand so tight it hurts. His eyelashes flutter and his lips part as I move a few inches away to get a good look at him.

And he's trying to look at me. He's trying to do what I'm asking.

His eyes are glassy when they open and they roll backwards a few times as he smacks his lips from the dryness ... from thirst. I hold my breath when he raises his empty hand, the one I'm not clinging to, and rubs his head. That's Jasper! He's rubbing his head to feel his hair like he always did! Please ... let him come out of this completely unscathed. Just ... let him come back. "Jazz?"

It takes him a second to turn toward the sound of my voice and if he's blind ... if he can't locate me ... I don't know what I will do. I don't have to worry too long, though, because his brown eyes find mine and slowly, so slowly that I almost fear he's building up to cry, a smile breaks across his face. It is absolutely, hands down, and beyond a shadow of a doubt ... the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

"Hi, Lee, hi!"

His voice, spread through with gravel and husky from lack of use, sounds like a symphony of angels and when I laugh ... it comes out with a sob of relief. My mom and dad are on the other side of the bed and I didn't even realize it. My dad is rubbing Jasper's leg and my mother has her head down, sobbing on Jazz's chest. Jasper puts a hand on her head and his smile fades, "They done hurt your head too, mama?"

"She's okay, kid," Joel tells him. He's standing next to me and he's got a hand on my back. "Do you hurt, Jasper?"

"Hurts." Jazz tugs his hand out of mine and points at the side of his head. For a second ... I think he's going to cry and then his eyes widen. "HI, YELLOW!!"

"Hi, buddy." Erica is on my right and she grins down at him, rubbing the spot on his head he touched. "Welcome back."

"I sleep! Long time!" Jazz says, grinning. His eyes find mine again. "I miss you. Not sleep no more!"

"I missed you, too." I don't think anyone in this room can possibly know how true those words are. I have missed him. Even like this ... with his brain not quite catching up to his body ... I've missed him. My flawed, slow, and gloriously naive brother ... is perfect.

I hear Derek clear his throat at the foot of the bed and we all look at him. He's smiling, but it's not the smile of someone who knows that he is a neurosurgeon god. It's the smile of someone who is genuinely pleased with Jasper and not with himself. I watch him lift the cover off Jasper's sock covered feet and squeeze his left one. "Do you feel that?" Derek asks. "Jasper, can you feel my hand?"

Jasper doesn't react.

Oh.

My.

God.

"Can you kick me?" Derek asks.

Jasper's eyes widen, scandalized. "I not kick nobody!"

"It's okay," Derek assured him, holding his hand a few inches over Jasper's foot. "Kick my hand."

"Bad. Kicking bad!" Jazz shakes his head, then rubs the side of it. "Ow."

"Move over," Erica whispers, nudging me to the side. She grins down at Jazz and walks her fingers over his chest, then she tickles his ribs.

He laughs.

And he kicks Derek in a place that Meredith will probably kill him for later on.

Jasper can move his legs!

He can speak.

He can see.

And the sound of his laughter is the most amazing, the most wonderful and BEAUTIFUL thing in the world.

My brother is back.

I close my eyes and think of the bullet that we've dodged this time.

And the tear that slides down my cheek is for the Alex Karev ... because maybe he took it for us.

Over the next few hours, Jasper drinks so much that the nurse is constantly coming in to change his output bag. I once danced with George because of his father's urine output and seeing Jasper's makes me feel like I could fly. When he complains of pain ... he gets medication through his IV and then sleeps for a while, but he wakes up smiling. He always wakes up smiling.

He always wakes up.

And he laughs when he hears my stomach rumbling and I realize that Erica and I have both skipped breakfast and lunch. I'm usually pretty good at doing that and hold up remarkably well, but Erica will be a viper if she doesn't eat soon. I give Jasper a kiss, tucking the cover around him and watch Nurse Kate give him an injection of morphine. He's asleep before he can tell me goodnight and that's okay. The mere fact that he CAN tell me goodnight is enough for me. I give Mom a kiss and turn to speak to Dad, but he pointedly ignores me in favor of hugging Erica and telling HER to have a great night.

If Joel had not already taken Trevor and gone to the Archfield ... he would be gloating. I bet he's already trying to figure out how to spend my part of the inheritance since I'll probably be cut out of any will my father leaves behind. Mom gives me an 'I told you so' look and I walk out of Jasper's room with my head down. It's impossible to feel completely elated when my father is pretending that I don't exist. Erica follows me to the elevator and we wait in silence for it to arrive. Once we're inside, completely alone ... it's another story.

She grabs me, hugs me, and plants a kiss on me that leaves me breathless.

"He's OKAY!" She cups my face and kisses me again. "Callie! He's perfect!"

I laugh at her because she's incredibly animated for someone that my mother called Mike Tyson. Twice.

We're still hugging when we arrive on the third floor, where we left our purses in my locker. She waits for me while I put my dress and heels back on and then we head down the hall together, chattering animatedly about nothing. And everything. I draw up short when I see Bailey talking to Meredith, Cristina, and George. Alex was her intern and she's wearing the loss of him in the sunken bags under her eyes. She's a mess. Webber joins them and nods and the five of them go into one of the nearby rooms.

"Oh my God," I whisper. "Let's go."

"What -"

I pull her along beside me, trying to run past the room that I know has to be Izzie Stevens'. The door is closed and I try not to think about the news she is about to receive. I press the button on the elevator and will it to arrive, but it doesn't come fast enough.

There are many sounds in this world that a person never forgets. You would know your mother's voice ... even if she's been dead for years. You know what it sounds like to gasp in pleasure and cry in regret. And I'm pretty sure that you know what your baby sounds like in a sea of a million when it starts to cry.

The sound that Izzie Stevens makes when they tell her that Alex died in her car is worse than anything I've ever imagined. I watched her let go of Denny and Alex Karev lift her into his arms and sit with her while she sobbed. It was quiet pain, it was breathless and gagging. I hope someone is there to lift her now because she's not sobbing ... she's not quiet. She's screaming and screaming and the hallway hangs onto it until it seems to come from every direction ... reverberating through my head.

I stare at my reflection in the steel elevator door and I know ... I know how easily that could have been me.

And I even know that there was a part of me, once upon a time, that would have relished the sound of the woman who authored so much of MY pain experiencing her own ... but I don't want to hear it now.

Or ever again.

The doors slide open to reveal Addison and she opens her mouth to say something, but nothing comes out because now Izzie's agony has invaded the elevator and Addy can hear it for herself. I watch my friend's face fall, I watch her eyes fill with tears and I step forward to hang onto her because that's all I can do. I'm still hanging onto her when I climb into the backseat of the car with her and Erica drives us home. It's not even a question. Addy needs to be with us tonight. Friends don't let friends downward spiral alone.

Addison goes straight to the guest room while Erica throws something together for dinner and I follow her, sitting down on the bed after she crawls under the cover. I take her hand in mine and say, "This will work out, Addison. It will."

She plumps the pillow under her cheek. "You remember when I hit Mark with the roses? I went to Joe's after I called you that night and Alex was there. Mark asked me what I did to my hair, but Alex said it was beautiful. He said that I was beautiful and ... god, he made me feel like I was. He said everything I needed to hear and we ... I had sex with him in the parking lot. And then I told him to stay away from me."

"It's okay." I put my hand over hers and she holds on tight. "Whatever happens ... I'll be here for you. You are not alone and you don't have to ever think about going back to California. You were not happy there and -"

"I'm not happy here, either." Addison makes a face. "Maybe I'm still being punished by the karma gods for what I did to Derek."

"The funny thing about karma is that it catches up to you wherever you go," I say. "And at least here ... you know you have someone who's willing to help you fight. That would be me in case you didn't get it."

She returns the smile I put on my face and says, "Jasper's okay? I can tell that he is because you're okay."

"He's amazing," I reply. "I don't think I've ever been that scared in my life. For fifteen years I have felt personal responsibility for everything that has happened in his life."

Her free hand moves to her belly and she leaves it there. "Personal responsibility is a scary thing."

"Did you take the test yet?"

"No." She shakes her head. "I'm not ready to know for sure because thinking I know for sure is already killing me. If I absolutely know for sure ... I may need a padded room for a while. Would you mind if I took a shower?"

"Not at all. I'll get you something comfortable to wear, too."

"Thanks, Cal. For everything."

I start to leave the room, but stop halfway. "I'm sorry about what I said to you at the airport. It's none of my business and I had no right to -"

"I'm sorry that I called you a drug addicted asshole who needed to be bitch slapped into next week."

I frown. "You didn't call me that."

"Not to your face. Let's just say that we were both wrong and call it even. Okay?"

"Okay."

I move around the bed and hug her. "I do love you, you know?"

"I do know. Too bad they didn't teach me 'Vagina Whispering' in college when I was learning everything else about them. I'd be giving Hahn a run for her money right about now."

"I can't handle being the object of everyone's affection," I tell her, holding up my hand. "I know that I'm hot and insanely desirable, but damn. Go take a cold shower and eat dinner with us, Addison. And no playing footsies with me under the table."

"You're onto me."

I find her a pair of Erica's yoga pants and a long sleeve thermal before I join Erica in the kitchen. In the small amount of time that I've been speaking to Addison, Yellow has whipped up a large salad and has cut leftover fried chicken into cubes. My stomach practically bellows its appreciation as I steal a few cucumber slices and pop them in my mouth. Erica gives me a look of horror. "You actually went for cucumber when there's something greasy right there?"

"I figured I'd start trying to seduce you early. Is it working?"

She takes a pan of yeast rolls out of the oven and makes sure they're nicely browned before she takes off her oven mitts. When she tosses them aside and pins me back against the sink I know that it's definitely working. "If we didn't have a houseguest, we'd be celebrating Jasper's recovery in the hot tub right now."

"Addison's in the shower. I could go club her on the head just hard enough to make her sleep all night."

"You're horrible." She kisses me despite her assessment of me and I pull her so close I can barely take it. "Callie?"

"Hmm?"

"You know how I told you I wasn't going to bite my tongue anymore?"

"Oh god ... what did I do now?"

"Don't be a hypocrite. It doesn't suit you."

"Okay, I'm officially lost."

Erica kisses my neck, then my jaw. "Don't judge Addison for wanting to leave, Callie, because you do that, too. She wants to run at the first sign of trouble and correct me if I'm wrong, but so do you. So save your righteous indignation for someone else. Not her. And especially not now."

Okay. I admit it. That stung. And I think maybe it's because the truth does hurt. Especially when it's coming from the only human being on the planet who makes you feel sixteen again. "I apologized to her."

"See? You don't need me to teach you anything." She winks at me and walks to the wine rack where she carefully chooses a bottle. "We should open something special, don't you think?"

When the time comes ... when Addison is smiling (and drinking milk in her wineglass ... oh how I will laugh at her if this is a false alarm) and Erica says that she'd like to make a toast, I put my hand on hers and say, "Let me?"

"Okay," she replies, smiling. "Knock yourself out."

I lift the glass in my hand and look at it. The wine inside is red and I think about the blood clot that Derek thinned in my brother's brain. I think about the blood that's pumping Jasper's heart and keeping his brain healthy and I know that Addison and Erica would both toast Jasper and his recovery, but I don't go there. "To Alex Karev ... whose life ended way too soon."

"And to Izzie Stevens," Addison adds. "Whose life will never be the same again."

Life.

As I click my glass to theirs ... I'm thinking about life and how fleeting our hold is.

Jasper's life was spared and I nearly squandered mine away.

Life has a lesson for us every day if we only pay attention.

I'm all ears now.


	33. Chapter 33

My first day back at work starts with a bang.

Literally.

The things that people do to each other is quite sickening. A store clerk, the victim of an early morning robbery, is brought in with a bullet lodged in his throat. The EMT has his finger's wrapped around the man's jugular vein to stop the bleeding and I take his spot, receiving a liberal dousing of blood for my efforts. It hits my face, my hair, my trauma gown and horrifies the intern to my left, who starts to cry. Why, oh why does my first day back at work coincide with an influx of new interns? I tell her to get out of my sight because if she cries ... I may cry ... and then I see that I have an audience. All of this is transpiring in front of my wide eyed parents who have arrived to visit with Jasper and neither of them listen to Addison telling them to go upstairs. They stand and watch and I start sweating because knowing that they are witnessing the education that they paid for in action is enough to make me have a nervous breakdown. I really do not want to fail in front of them. Not today.

I'm so grateful when Mark arrives that I could scream.

We work in tandem, ordering tests, barking out orders and trying to rush enough blood into the patient to make up for what he has lost.

It's not enough.

His airway is too compromised.

When I let him go so that Mark can shock him ... he pretty much bleeds out and we're done.

It's over.

My parents have experienced me losing a patient and when I call the time of death and pull my gloves off ... they look as thunderstruck as I feel. Mark unties my gown and I pull off the face guard (that didn't do much) before I walk toward them. Lexie appears with a wet cloth and points at her own chin so I wipe mine, grimacing at the amount of blood that's on me. I need a shower. Stat. My mother has a hand over her chest as she watches me and when I'm a few feet away, she says, "Are you okay, sweetheart?"

"It never gets easier." I roll my head around to work out some of the tension, but it doesn't work. Traumas that roll in so quickly are always the ones that leave you halfway on your knees because your legs are too weak to support you. The mask of bravado that I'm wearing is so fake that they have to see it, they have to know. "But I'm fine," I lie.

"What happened to him?" Dad asks, shocking me. He's actually speaking to me now? "It - it was bad."

"Robbery," I reply. "Gunshot wound."

"Seattle's not very safe." That's my father for you. He assigns blame to inanimate things because he refuses to believe that people, not a place, are the truest form of evil in the world. I don't wear those kinds of blinders. We're all accountable. All the time.

The doors to the ER burst open behind us and a teenage girl rushes in, her eyes frantic as she looks left and right. She's carrying her worry on her features and I don't have to wonder who she's looking for. I hear her say something about her father and Mark steps out from behind the curtain. He's carrying a wallet in his hand and when the girl announces a name ... Mark's eyes find mine and he nods. It's one brief, curt affirmation and I can't watch anything else. He's about to break someone's heart and I'm still too raw over nearly losing Jasper to witness it. "Let's go," I tell my parents, nodding at the elevator. I grip both of their hands in mine. "Come on."

The doors slide closed before the girl sobs, but the sound of it travels after us and goes straight through me like the bullet that tore through her father.

I think about Izzie Stevens as I watch the numbers light up. You can never outrun pain. Ever.

I'm still holding my dad's hand and he's letting me. He's actually stroking the back of mine with his thumb.

It's enough.

Beside me, Mom clears her throat. "You did everything you could."

Lori Anne Torres has no idea if I did everything I could or not. She once treated a stomach ache with Nyquil so she's not really the authority on medicine, but I give her a smile because she tried to help me out. She returns it and pats me on the arm which is thankfully free of blood. My hair is sticking to me, however, and I can feel a steady trickle over my eyebrow. I dab at it with the cloth Lexie gave me and cringe when the acrid smell of it reaches my nostrils. Blood and death ... two things you will never, ever enjoy smelling.

When the doors open, Erica is standing on the other side flipping through a chart. She looks up, drops the chart and grabs me in one fell swoop. "Oh my god! You're hurt! What happened? Are you -"

"It's not mine. I lost a patient." I'd be lying if I said I wasn't enjoying her reaction. Erica Freakin' Hahn can remain stoic about almost anything ... except me. She's not the cold hearted bitch that people accuse her of being if I'm in the picture. She doesn't just wear her heart on her sleeve ... she dangles it by a tiny little thread that I control. "I'm okay, baby."

Apparently having an audience doesn't bother Erica. And neither does blood. She yanks me into her arms and hugs me, rubbing my back. "God, Callie! I thought you were - you gave me a heart attack!"

The elevator doors try to close on us three times before she lets me go and she only relents at all because my mother tells us to stop blocking the exit because we're making her claustrophobic. I note that my father looks amused as Erica demands to know why I don't have on trauma gear and threatens to report me for 'endangering my safety'. He pats her on the back, retrieves her chart, and points out that we both need a shower now, wrinkling his nose as the splattering of blood on her cheek. Erica takes my hand, pulling me down the hall without another word. My mother, I note, is so scandalized at the obvious connotations that she's rendered speechless. We're showering. Together. Stop the presses. I'm sure I'll hear about it later.

I explain what happened as Erica grabs clean scrubs for both of us. She's a great listener, but when she retrieves a couple of towels and turns the water on in the Attending's Bathroom (which is way nicer than the resident's!), I stop talking and watch her instead. She pulls her soiled scrub shirt off and tosses it into the corner. Her bra is slung across the bench and I hold my breath as she fumbles with the knot in her scrub pants. I know what's underneath. Blue panties. THOSE blue panties. And just a couple of hours ago ... I slid them back in place after I woke her up with my face buried between her thighs. She told me on the flight to Italy that she wanted to wake me up by tracing her name against me and that's exactly what I did. Her hands were tangled in my hair before I got to the second 'L' in my name and after she returned the favor ... I assured her that the 'R' in her name felt JUST RIGHT against me. So she did it again.

Addison wound up leaving without us, but she did leave a nice little note that read, 'Note to self: buy ear plugs when staying with the very loud lesbians.'

Erica catches my eye and winks at me and my heart does a flopping dance in my chest that is almost painful. Almost. It races full steam ahead when she lifts my shirt and it joins hers in the floor. I just watched a man die, yet I've never felt more alive. I've never been reminded more of why I'm here, why I'm a doctor, why I try.

Everyone should have moments like this.

Everyone sick should be healed long enough to feel this kind of love just ONCE before they die.

She unties my pants and I toe my shoes off, then my socks. When she pulls me into the shower ... I close my eyes and let the water wash away the blood. I don't watch it turn the water pink or think about loss at all. I think about what I've gained. I got the girl I wanted. My brother woke up. I'm alive and I'm here and she's massaging shampoo into my hair that kind of stinks because it's hospital grade, but I don't care.

We don't just bathe and I wish we could take our time and slowly love each other, but that's not going to happen. We're at work, but she makes great use of her hands, very quickly, to get me off. I return the favor and she whispers that I scared her, that just the thought of me being hurt terrifies her.

I promise her that I'll always be okay.

How can I not be perfectly fine when she's in my life?

"Oh wow. You still work here, Calliope?"

"Zip it, Elvis."

"What did you do to your hair?"

I self consciously touch my head. I had to use the hand dryer in the bathroom and without any product my hair so curly and thick that I broke my scrunchie trying to put it in a ponytail. It really is tragic looking. Cristina said I looked like a Chia Pet. "Asks the idiot who uses so much gel that he looks like an oil slick."

"You're just jealous that you obvious didn't have any. And you desperately needed it."

"Go away."

Denying my fervent command, Gavin pulls out the seat beside mine and flops into it. I'm attempting to make notes in my own chart when he drops the one he's holding down on top of it. "What do you think?"

I move it aside. "Do you mind?"

"Can you give me a second opinion?" He pushes it back toward me. "I'm serious. This is truly work related."

I shoot him the dirtiest look I can possibly muster. I'm in an exceptionally good mood because I was able to spend time with Jasper after my very productive shower. I took him a snake and he wolfed it down, then ate mine. He's doing great ... actually, Derek used the word 'amazing' to describe Jasper's progress. His color has returned and they have taken his catheter out (which he did NOT care for and told us repeatedly that we broke his private) so that he can use the restroom on his own. I don't even mind that he had an accident and forced me to change his bed sheets because he kept hugging me, kept telling me he loves me, and told me that I was his favorite Lee. He's my favorite Jazz and it's almost lunchtime now. I want to spend it with him. I want to spend every second with him because he's back. And I was desperately afraid he would never come back at all.

I open the chart that is 'truly work related' and scowl down at the colorful flier inside. "What the hell is this?"

"Just read it." Gavin props his chin on his elbow and stares at me, grinning devilishly. "And then say 'yes, Dr. Cole, I'd love to'."

"'Charity Fundraiser'," I read aloud. "'Do you have a talent? How would you like to showcase your mad skills and help the Denny Duquette Memorial Clinic raise funds? If you can sing, dance, paint, belch the alphabet, or do armpit farting ... please sign up below or speak with Dr. Gavin Cole, who is organizing this year end event'." I close the binder and scowl. "Armpit farting? Seriously?"

"It's an art. And guess what?"

"I'm afraid to."

"Your mother saw me making that clever little notice and assured me that you can sing like you swallowed an angel. So, put your name down and if you're really nice to me ..."

"Never happening." I pick up the chart and thrust it into his lap. "No way."

"Which part? You're not singing or you're not being nice to me?"

"Both."

"Aww, man!" He looks like a little boy who just missed the ice cream truck. "Come on! I let you operate on Emma! I even let you survive calling me 'Elvis' when all the little voices told me to suffocate you. You owe me. And I'm collecting!"

"I don't owe you a thing! You 'let' me operate because it's your job and the fact that you have survived calling me Calliope -"

"This isn't up for discussion. You either sign up or you're not in on Emma's NEXT surgery!"

That stops me cold. "Emma's having another surgery?"

He nods. "Eventually. We're going to be working with plastics to build her a set of ears and redefine the bone structure around her eye sockets. And if you want in on that -"

"You can't keep me out of surgery!"

"Your girlfriend does it all the time with Dr. Yang." Gavin helps himself to the chocolate covered raisins that I bought a few minutes earlier. "Besides, no one else has signed up yet and if you do it ... maybe they will."

"I thought the clinic was doing just fine! Miranda said that it's making money now."

"It's breaking even. Besides, it stands to reason that people who need a free clinic also need free medicine. We should stock up on the things that we routinely prescribe."

"And you actually think that people are going to pay to see a bunch of doctors makes asses of themselves?" I shake my head at him. "You've lost your mind."

"I don't think so. I did this same thing in Boston. We had a clinic that needed a little help so I organized some entertainment." He offers me MY candy like it belongs to him, then laughs when I snatch it from him. "And I'm not just talking about doctors performing, Cal. I have pretty famous friends and I can make things happen."

"Then let your famous friends sing. I'm not doing it."

"It'll be fun."

"No."

He puts his hand over his heart, looking miserable. "I sure will miss you in Emma's surgery. And you're going to regret this because Discovery Health Care has decided to film a documentary about her. You'd get a lot of exposure and that's pretty damn good for someone who's going to be finishing up their residency and shopping around for a fellowship. You wouldn't need an introduction after this ... they'd be knocking on your door."

Well, shit. I lean back in my chair and study his face. He doesn't break eye contact, doesn't even blink. I know he's telling the truth. "Would you actually let me operate again?"

"Yes."

"And you wouldn't make me look like an idiot on camera?"

"You don't need any help." He laughs out loud when I hit him with my chart, then massages his arm. "Is that a yes?"

"It's an 'I'll think about it', Cole," I reply, getting to my feet. "Has Mark agreed to perform the surgery on Emma?"

"Sloan? I haven't asked him. I was thinking of calling in -"

"If Mark doesn't do it ... I'm not interested."

Gavin gives me a bemused grin. "Oh reaaaaally? You still carrying a torch for the guy or what?"

"Happily engaged, remember?" I flash my hand at him. "And my personal life is still, as always, off limits to you."

"Then let's talk about the professional life that you have been shirking for days. In the future, I expect to be notified if you're going to be absent because you had six surgeries on the board that I had to readjust my schedule to take care of and I don't appreciate it." He stands up as well, casually stretching. "How do you expect to learn anything if you're never here?"

"Excuse me, but I had a family emergency and -"

"That's funny, Dr. Torres, because your family was HERE and you weren't. Don't make me put you on probation for your attendance."

My bottom jaw drops open. "Who do you think you are? Chief Webber?"

"It's my job to make sure my department is controlled. That means that you, Miss Never Here, answer to me and I answer to the Chief." He picks up the chart and gets to his feet, tucking it under his arm. "I'll let it slide this time on the condition that you sign up for my fund raiser and don't disappoint me."

"You better cling to that damn chart really tight because the little voices in my head are telling me that it would fit nicely up your ass."

He grins at me. "I can't wait until rehearsals start. Should be fun."

I watch him walk down the hall and he's whistling. He's actually whistling.

I wonder if it's too late to change my specialty.

I bet I'd be a great general surgeon.

I seek refuge in Jasper's room for lunch, just as I had planned. He is so happy to see me that he knocks his pitcher of ice water into his lap and I find myself changing his bed for the second time. Erica comes in while I'm working and helps him put on a fresh gown. I notice that she makes him do the majority of the work and gently corrects him when he tries to put both arms through one hole. She doesn't do it for him. She doesn't do ANYTHING for him. When he tells her that he's thirsty, she takes him down the hall to refill his pitcher and I know that she lets him do it because I can hear him exclaiming over the ice dispenser all the way back in his room. When they come back (he has a new sticker on his gown), she steadies his hand as he pours his own glass of water and hands him a straw which he painstakingly unwraps. If my mother was not in the cafeteria, she would be furious that Erica's making him struggle for everything.

I'm not really crazy about it either, but Jazz is so eager to please her and earn praise that he doesn't mind.

In my gut, I know that it's GOOD to make him self sufficient, but my heart wants me to take care of his every need while I can because if this surgery works ... he won't need me much longer.

Erica tucks him into the bed while I put his sheets in the hamper and when I turn around she's hugging him. Her hair has suffered as much as mine since our shower and Jasper notices. He runs his fingers through it and shakes his head when she stands up. "You hair need help! Lee! Where my comb?"

I find his bag and pull out his favorite brush. It's the same one that I used on Emma when she asked for a braid. "He's going to make a mess of your ha-"

"He's going to make it beautiful," she corrects me, taking the brush and handing it to him. She sits with her back to him and he happily combs through her golden locks, dragging his fingers through it behind every stroke. I'm pretty sure that she's enjoying it as much as he is and I lean down and give her a kiss. She keeps me there for a second one and that's what we're doing when my parents come back from lunch.

"Oh for heaven's sake!" Mom says. "You live together, girls! Can't you ... control yourselves?"

"No," I reply honestly, running the back of my hand over Erica's cheek. "We can't."

"What is that smell? It's flowery."

"It's my lotion," Erica tells her. "The hospital soap here is horrible so I tried to mask it."

"Is it ... it's lilac, right?" My father asks, breathing deep. "It smells wonderful. I like it."

"Callie hates lilac," Mom says, fussing over Jasper's blanket.

Erica looks at me, brow raised. "Do you?"

"I love lilac." I'm prepared to wax poetic about how much her lilacs haunted me, but my mother doesn't let me.

"Calliope Iphigenia Torres, you buried a lilac bush in our backyard! I had to save the damn thing and nurse it back to health." She plumps Jazz's pillow next, speaking to Erica now. "She enlisted Jasper to help her dig a hole big enough to put a Volvo in and -"

"We buried it!" Jazz bellows. "In the sand! Flowers!"

"Really?" Erica looks thoroughly amused. "When was that?"

"A few days after Jasper's birthday." Mom readjusts the IV tubing, fussing over every detail. "She took Addison to the airport and came back with that huge plant. I had no idea what she was doing. I was sure she was drunk again when I saw what she was up to."

"Okay, number one ... I was not drunk the night that Addison nearly got us arrested and number two ... it just ... felt like the right thing to do." I cross my arms over my chest. "Number three ... quit talking about me."

Erica is grinning so big that I KNOW what's coming. "This was right after your little text message tantrum, wasn't it?"

I narrow my eyes at her. "You provoked me."

"Yeah. I know." She gets to her feet and kisses my forehead. "If it helps at all ... I bought a comic book just so I could burn it."

I have to smile. "What kind of comic book?"

"Captain America."

I gasp. "That's blasphemy."

Jasper starts laughing. "Blazz Phemey!"

Erica's pager goes off and she groans, making a face when she sees the message. "I have to go."

She drops a kiss on Jasper's head, thanks him for combing her hair and tells my parents she'll see them later. When she hugs me, she whispers, "You so have it bad for me."

"Shut up."

I watch her leave like the lovesick freak that I am.

I don't make apologies for it either.

Jasper's lunch arrives a second later and my stomach gives a mighty growl. Dad lowers his newspaper a fraction of an inch to look at me over it. He doesn't miss a thing, my dad.

And neither does Jasper.

"You hungry, Lee! You have this!" Jasper offers me his tray, but I shake my head and cut up his Salisbury steak for him. He's got half of it devoured by the time I finish and I rub his head, watching him scarf it down. There's gravy all over his teeth when he smiles at me and he belches enthusiastically. "Good dinner! 'Scuse me!"

"Have you eaten today?" Mom asks me, opening Jasper's apple juice as he stuffs a roll into his mouth.

"Not yet," I reply, tugging on the roll until it tears in half so that he doesn't choke on it. "There was a lot of paperwork after this morning."

"Santos," Mom cuts me off, "why don't you take your daughter to the cafeteria and buy her lunch? I'll stay here with Jasper."

The newspaper goes back up and Dad feigns deafness as he hides behind it. Mom narrows her eyes and then stalks across the room, snatching it from him. She rolls it up and whacks him on the head with it. "I've had it with your stubborn pride. Now get!"

"Are you actually accusing me of having stubborn pride, Lori Anne?" His voice is mocking. "Surely you realize that I've learned from you."

"You will be thanking your lucky stars that we are in the hospital if you don't move it, buster," Mom tells him. "Go on!"

Dad stands up before she can hit him again and puts his hands on his hips. "Perhaps she doesn't want to eat with me."

"Why would she?" Mom growls. "After the way you've behaved? Honestly, Santos, this is your daughter and yes, she was incredibly stupid to do what she did -"

"Standing here!" I say. "And he doesn't have to go with me. I know where the cafeteria is."

"He's going!" Mom points at the door. "And he better come back here and tell me that the two of you have mended fences because I will not tolerate this jack assery another second. Jasper, tell your father to buy Callie something to eat."

"She hungry, Dad! Belly goes grrrrr." Jasper points at my stomach. "Loud."

"Fine!" Dad stalks past me and opens the door. "Are you coming, Calliope?

Great.

Why do the men in my life resort to calling me that?

The elevator ride to the cafeteria is so tense that I hold my breath. Dad walks along beside me in the hall and stands a few feet behind me as I pick out a greasy slice of pizza, fries, and a Coke. He adds two pieces of chocolate cake to my tray and I tell myself that it's a peace offering, but I really don't believe it. We find a table in the corner and I load my fries with ketchup while he watches me. I feel fourteen again and I've just been caught stealing his car for a joyride. I put the ketchup bottle down and lean back in my chair, ignoring my food in favor of looking at him.

"Eat. Right now."

"I can't eat when you're so pissed at me, Daddy. I'm sorry. I was wrong and I know that."

"Do you?"

"Yes. I just - I couldn't handle it."

"Why?"

I worry my bottom lip between my teeth. "Because it felt like it was all my fault. And I didn't want to be awake and see you guys blaming me. I was blaming myself enough. So ... I just ... bowed out."

"Bowed out? Bowed out!? You put yourself into a coma like a cowardly little shit!" he snaps. "You know better. You have no right to behave this way! I'd like to shake you until your teeth rattle!"

"I can assure you that Erica rattled my teeth enough for the both of you."

"Don't expect me to sympathize. You're lucky that I didn't drag you across my knee." He narrows his eyes when I sigh. "I still might so you would be well advised to keep that in mind."

"I said I'm sorry."

"And that's supposed to make me feel better about you almost dying?"

"I did not almost die, Dad! I knew what I was doing."

"You have more than proven that's not the case at all, Calliope! You most certainly did NOT know what you were doing."

I don't even attempt to stop the tears that have been burning my eyes from falling. I let them go and I know it's a cheap, girl thing to do, but I can't help myself. "The possibility of losing Jasper made me crazy, okay? You guys get him all the time. You get to see him and hug him and have him! I don't! So if he was going to die ... I didn't want to see it! I couldn't see it! I see enough death and suffering. How can you expect me to watch him leave me when I'm guilty of always leaving him!? I felt like failed him."

"You didn't leave him! You grew up. He didn't. It's not YOUR fault and it's not HIS fault. What happened to Jasper could happen to anyone. It's what we do with him and for him NOW that matters. And you disappointed him and me by what you did, but you let yourself down more. You failed YOURSELF, Callie."

Dad's glare feels like scalding water as it rakes over my face and then he reaches forward with a napkin and dabs at my cheek. When he leans back, he looks a little softer around the edges, but I know that the bite isn't completely gone. I watch him take a deep breath and brace myself for it. He doesn't disappoint.

"You are a Torres! You are strong, you are beautiful, and you can handle anything ... ANYTHING ... because I raised you to be able to do so. Don't you ever ... under any circumstances ... play Russian Roulette with your life again. Because it will be the last thing you do if I find out about it and I mean it! Do you understand me?"

"Yes, sir."

"Now eat."

My eyes are burning with fresh tears and I know that I can't possibly swallow any food past the lump in my throat so I keep sitting there. I watch Dad pluck his piece of cake from my tray, but I don't move. I can't move. He moves for me. He slides into the chair next to me instead of across from me and unwraps my fork, stabbing it into the remaining piece of cake. "You always asked for dessert first, mija, and this time I'm saying yes."

I let him brush another tear off my cheek and put my hand over his. "I really am sorry."

He leans over and kisses my forehead. "Then don't do it again. I won't be as forgiving a second time."

Eating dessert first is overrated. It makes my pizza taste like hell when I finally get to it, but I still finish it off. Dad talks about Jasper's surgery and I answer all of his questions as best I can and then he asks me about Erica. I assure him that we're fine, even though I'm a little pissed at her. I don't mention that part. He takes my hand and studies my ring, smiling proudly. It thrills me to know that he is genuinely happy for me. As he strokes the diamond I remember that Erica's own father is going to be making an appearance.

"Daddy?"

"What, honey?"

"Do you think you could get a private investigator to check someone out?"

"Absolutely. Who did you have in mind?"

I tell him.

Everything.

By the time my pager goes off and I have to leave ... he's already on the phone.

There's something wonderful about scrubbing in on a surgery where the stakes are high and you rise to the challenge despite the tension of the day. That's what I do after lunch. A three car pile up puts four people in our emergency room and one of those, a woman with two kids that she tells me all about, needs my help putting her leg back together. She will be in traction for a couple of weeks, but really, she's alive and I'm almost positive she won't have a limp. These are the kinds of surgeries that a doctor lives for. You give someone BACK to their family with only a few scars.

I spot Mark standing at the nurse's station and sidle up to him, nudging him with my shoulder. He needs a shave and his hair is a mess, but he smiles when he sees me. "Hey, Cal. I have it on good authority that I should thank you for getting me into Emma Foster's reconstruction surgery."

"What?" I raise a brow.

"Dr. Wannabe Rockstar said that you're going to sing for him in exchange for me leading the plastics portion of her surgery. This is massive. It's a documentary and -"

"That god damned asshole!" I slap a hand to my forehead. "Help me kill him, Mark. Please? I'll do the dirty work if you just dig the hole."

Mark laughs. "Why would I let you have all the fun? I hate the bastard, too."

"Why do you hate him?"

The smile fades from his face. "I don't want to talk about it."

"Oh come on! Tell me!"

He leans a little closer, shooting covert looks left and right. "I haven't gotten laid since ... Addison ... and it's because of him that the nurses are -"

"Shut up!" My eyes widen. "He's sleeping with the nurses? Ew. Who in their right mind would -"

"No! He's not. He has them brainwashed into little support groups for singles and has talked enough shit about fraternizing that every woman in this place has locked down so tight that a crow bar wouldn't even help." Mark scratches his chin. "And I'm always here. My dating options are limited to here. And he's pissed in my punchbowl."

"Support groups for singles? Jesus Christ! Cole really does think he's the second coming, doesn't he?"

"I know! Just because he's celibate he obviously thinks that everyone else should be, too."

I watch as Mark rakes a hand through his hair in exasperation. "Or, you know, you could make up with Addison."

"Not. Happening. Did you see how she was this morning? She's been drinking your girlfriend's venom and spewing it all over me."

"Mark -"

"I knew that she had sex with Karev before she moved to California. I saw the two of them coming out of the on call room and I knew," he snaps. "I did not know that she slept with him since then until she blurted it out to me after he died."

"Okay, in her defense, the two of you were not together. Mark - Mark, look at me."

He does and his jaw is tight. "Do not defend her."

I put my hand on his arm, patting it. "She loves you. And you love her. Just ... talk to her."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"Yeah, Mark ... why not? You're the one to blame."

I grit my teeth and turn around. Addison is a few feet behind us. She's still wearing her street clothes under her lab coat and she looks beautiful. She looks like a woman in charge, completely put together, and a force to be reckoned with. I see Mark looking her up and down out of the corner of my eye. This? It's uncomfortable. I try to leave. I really, truly attempt to get the hell out of dodge, but Mark grips my lab coat and holds me hostage.

"Do you see this?" he growls. "You almost killed her."

"I most certainly did not!" Addison taps her foot and there's something about a Manolo on the floor that sounds like a gun being loaded. "She's an adult. I can't help it if she's a crazy adult."

"Someone should take your prescription pad away from you," he suggests. "And burn it! You saw the shape she was in!"

I feel someone smack his hand off my shoulder and turn around to see that Erica has joined us. This has all the makings of World War III and I really want nothing more than to take off my white coat and wave it around in surrender. Erica walks around us and stands next to Addison and I swear on all things Nintendo ... I actually see the battle line appear on the white, sterile floor. It's ugly. And I'm tempted to move around just so I can straddle it. "Go away, Sloan," she says.

"You look like shit," Mark tells her, wrinkling his nose. I'm pretty sure that he has noticed the stench of my hair, but he looks at Erica when he adds, "And check it out. You smell like it, too."

"You really are going to be six years old forever, huh?" Erica snaps, putting her hands on her hips. "Why don't you toddle on down the hall, Sloan, and leave her alone."

"Callie!" Mark snaps. "Tighten the chain on your pit bull before I -"

"I'M SWITZERLAND!" I cry, throwing my hands up. "Do not bring me into it!"

"You are in it! She nearly killed you!" Mark points at Addison. "You - you're an over-prescribing malpractice suit waiting to happen!"

"She's SWITZERLAND!" Addison growls. "SHE DOESN'T SUE!"

"And she did it to herself!" Erica adds. "Don't make excuses for her when you can't even make a decent one for yourself."

"What is that supposed to mean?" Mark demands. "This isn't my fault! I didn't -"

"I didn't say it was your fault," Addison interjects. "I said that I was going to blame you."

"You're blaming me for your inability to keep your pants zipped?" Mark's eyebrows shoot skyward.

"Pot, kettle." Erica points back and for between the two. "Don't you have a nose to rebuild, Sloan? A lip injection to get to?"

"Don't you have a heart to rip out with your teeth?" Mark counters. "Beast."

"I'd rather be a beast than a -"

"STOP IT!" I shout. "Just ... all of you. Shut up! Erica, stay out of it!"

Erica and Addison both look at me like I just violated Article 4, Section 1 of the 'Vagina Carriers Solidarity Handbook', but I keep the steely look on my face and lift my chin defiantly. Mark's pager goes off and I swear I feel it like a divine act of intervention when he swear and stalks off. Addison and Erica give each other a high five and put their heads together, then Addison says, "Toddler!" in a very, very loud voice.

Mark doesn't turn to look back.

And he's not the only one who isn't laughing.

My parents are gone and Jazz is sitting on the bed staring out the window when I check on him before my shift ends. He doesn't hear me come in and I enjoy the view. He's so innocent, so handsome as the light plays across his face. I wonder what he's thinking. I wonder what it's like to be trapped with a mind that doesn't know what betrayal feels like, or jealousy, or worry. Is that such a bad place to be? I think I'd gladly trade with him sometimes. I'd like to look outside with that childlike sweetness that he has and not think about anything else for a while.

"Lee?"

"Hey, Buddy," I tell him, crossing the room. He must've noticed me while I was lost in thought. "How do you feel?"

"I can walk? Outside?"

"Aww, sweetie, you can't go outside yet." I rub his cheek when his face falls. "But I can walk you around in the hallway. Would you like that?"

"Sticker! Yellow give me!"

"Yeah, I can find you a sticker, too."

"Okay!" He shoves the cover down and wiggles his bare toes in excitement. I rummage in his bag and locate a pair of plaid pajama pants and his slippers and he nearly knocks me over in his haste to put them on. He listens intently as I explain that he has to hold my hand and not run, because his IV tubing isn't very long. I let him hang the saline bag on the rolling IV and watch him wrap his hand around it and take a few steps. He runs over his foot and almost falls, crying out in shock.

"Tell you what, buddy," I say, taking his arm in mine, "you let me pull the IV and you pull me, okay?"

"I not pull! I hold you hand!"

He does just that, looping his fingers through mine as we walk across the floor together. In the hallway, he draws up short, closes his eyes, and takes a deep breath. I don't know what he's doing but I mimic him, trying to experience life his way. When I open my eyes he's smiling at me. "See it, Lee?"

"See what, Jazzy?"

"Happy. Walk now."

He saw happy and looking at him ... I do the same. I find him a sticker at the nurse's station and he lets me put it on his gown. A couple of the nurses greet him sweetly and he waves, telling them that 'his Lee' is walking him. He's proud to be with me. And I'm floating along beside him in a pure joy because he's HERE. We travel the length of the hall and he chatters non stop about his shoes, his pants, the heavy heart monitor in the pocket of his gown, and about me being hungry. He remembered that and it must have bothered him. We reach the end of the corridor and can go left, right, or back ... and he chooses left. I tag along, feeling like I'm following hope. I'm so busy listening to him that I don't realize where he's led me.

We're outside the chapel and someone is sobbing inside.

The sound makes me reach for his arm to pull him along, but he has other plans. He takes the portable IV in his own hand and moves it from the linoleum to the carpet of the chapel with absolute ease. Something is obviously pulling him forward .. something that neither of us can control. I don't want to make a scene and if I grab him and try to force him to leave ... he may start to cry himself. I docilely follow along behind him, ready to apologize for the intrusion, when I recognize the blond head in the front pew. I'd know her anywhere. She's haunted enough of my dreams.

Izzie Stevens has her head down in a choking, sobbing, prayer and her fingers are working through her rosary beads as she cries.

Jasper sits down beside her before I stop him and puts his hand on her shoulder. "There there, lady. God no want you cry."

I see Izzie turn her head toward him and he rubs her cheek, then her hair. She lets him, muttering, "Hey."

"Hi, lady, hi," Jasper touches her beads. "That?"

"My rosary beads," Izzie tells him, holding them out. "You want to see?"

"My daddy gots 'em, too," Jazz tells her, taking them and gingerly sliding his fingers over them. "You sad?"

"Yeah," Izzie replies. "I'm sad."

"Why?"

Every instinct I have is to rush forward and stop them, to let her grieve in peace, but my feet will NOT do it. I hold my breath as Izzie says, "My baby died. And then my best friend died, too." She cries so hard when she says it that I have doubts Jasper will understand her. "I - I should have died. It should have been me."

"No. You not die." Jazz moves closer and puts his arm around her. I watch him close his eyes and move his head back and forth slowly. "Jesus love me 'es I know fo da Biple tell me so."

Izzie blows her nose and cries even harder as Jazz continues to mutilate the song. I'm stunned a moment later when she puts her head on his shoulder and he pats her blond ponytail like he would pat Buddha. "I can't believe he's dead," she sobs. "Alex is dead."

"Not dead, lady. Heaven." Jasper points up at the large Jesus sculpture behind the altar. I made fun of it once ... when I saw them installing it. I'm ashamed ... because it gives him some measure of comfort. "Him see us all. Hear us, too."

Izzie continues to weep for a man and her baby.

Jasper continues to warble church songs that he gets confused with Barney songs.

And I step outside the chapel so that I won't be an unwelcome invader if Izzie turns around to see who else is there.

I don't know how much time passes, but I do a lot of thinking. I think about second chances and living life to the fullest. I think about how easily I could have died and how it could be Erica sitting in that front pew crying with Jasper. I wanted to sleep through the aftermath of his surgery and I could have put myself to sleep forever. I could have left Jazz behind to comfort everyone ... and miss me.

This day really, truly needs to end.

Now.

It startles me when Addison puts her hand on my arm and says, "I took the test."

"And?"

She runs a hand through her hair. "I'm am officially one of those women that I used to make fun of. Who's the daddy? Is it Sloan or Karev?"

"WHAT!?"

There are moments in life that happen in slow motion. I can hear the shock and desperation in the voice behind us and I know that when I turn around ... Izzie Stevens will look broken, devastated, and lost. There was actually a time that I prayed for Stevens to get her comeuppance. I actually asked God for any number of calamities to befall her. I didn't want to see her destroyed, but I wanted to witness something that could make me feel a little better about what she had put me through. I asked for pimples, crabs, or green hair ... anything to make her something more human than the blond, stacked, centerfold who slept with my husband and then tormented me by rubbing that fact in my face. Never, ever ... did I want this and when I do finally look at her, where she's standing bent a little with a hand on her empty belly, I wish I could take it all back. I wish that I was in a position to hug her or extend my hand or be the one helping hold her upright. I've only wanted to trade places with Jasper a few times.

This is one of those.

He has his arm around her and she's clutching at his hand while she pushes her IV with the other. I reach out and instinctively pull it over the hump where the carpet meets the tile, but she doesn't walk forward with it. Her brown eyes, sunken and red rimmed, are on Addison. I don't know what she's thinking. I don't know if seeing the woman who couldn't save her baby actually carrying one of her own is hurting her as much as I think it is. Or maybe it's the fact that Addison, in her forties, still has the equipment that she had to take from Izzie ... who is only in her twenties. Whatever it is ... it causes an ache in my own womb, that's where I feel it, because I can only imagine what it's like to know that you gave away the only thing you can never have again. She had a baby at sixteen ... I don't know if it's a blessing or a curse now.

Jasper touches my arm and says, "ZZ said 'what', Lee. You answer!"

His voice makes Izzie look at him and then at me. Her eyes focus and the most breathtakingly beautiful smile I've ever seen on anyone's face in my life breaks across hers. She lets go of the IV and reaches for Addison, and when she hugs her, the redhead looks at me in confusion. She rubs Izzie on the back and says, "Uh ... how ... how are you feeling, Dr. Stevens?"

Izzie backs up a step. The hysterectomy was invasive and when he hand goes back to her stomach I realize that she's putting pressure on the incision. It must be hurting. Or itching. Or maybe she has to touch it to remember that it's real. I hold my breath when she lets Jasper go and reaches out again ... this time touching Addison's stomach. "Alex - he said that he was going to tell everyone that my baby was his. He told me that he always wanted a baby and he'd take mine any day. We were on our way to look at a crib when we wrecked ... when I wrecked. He said that he wanted to put it together and he would keep it in his room." She laughs, but it's really a sob and my eyes fill with tears. "He joked and said that he would use it to keep his laundry in, but I knew that he was going to put a stuffed bear in it. You - you can have the bear now, Dr. Montgomery. For - for his baby."

Addison's cheeks are wet with her own tears as she puts her hand over Izzie's. "I - I don't know that this is - it could be -"

"I heard you," Izzie tells her in a quavering voice, "but I - I think it has to be Alex's. He couldn't really have left us all with nothing. Right? Not when he had so much to give. Right? Right? Dr. Montgomery ... right?"

Izzie starts to sob and I look behind her, where Jasper is watching with wide eyes. He's terrified. I can see it. He can't wrap his head around this kind of pain and when his chin quivers. "Jasper, let's go back to your room. You need your medicine."

I give Addison a pointed look on 'medicine'. She needs to be very liberal with Stevens' medication and she nods her red head in confirmation. "Izzie," she gently says, "why don't you come with me?"

"Where ZZ going?" Jasper's voice breaks over the words as Izzie steps around him and lets Addison lead her down the hall. "I go?"

"Not this time, buddy." I firmly grip his arm and his IV and drag him along with me. He walks sideways, keeping his eyes behind us and I give up trying to get his attention. When we get to his room ... he throws up his hand and I turn.

Izzie Stevens is waving at my brother from the end of the hallway.

And he smiles at her before she disappears around the corner. "ZZ," he tells me, "yellow, too."

"Yeah, I guess she is."

"Sad."

"She's sad," I agree, helping him into the bed. I take off his slippers and settle him underneath the cover. "Are you okay? Does your head hurt?"

"No, Lee." He touches his incision, then moves his hand to his heart. "I hurt here."

I lean down and press a kiss where he indicated and lean my head against him. I can feel the steady strumming of his heart and close my eyes when he hugs me. "Is that better, buddy?"

"Not this time."

I hope he hangs onto that honesty if he comes back to me all the way.

No ... not if.

WHEN he comes back to me.

I'll remind him to always tell the truth.

"You're really quiet tonight, Callie."

Erica has her head in my lap and I glance at the clock. Almost an hour has passed since we settled on the couch to watch something on television. I think it was a show I wanted to see, but I haven't paid any attention to it. I stop threading my fingers through her blond hair when she rolls onto her back and looks up at me. I can't believe I ever thought that green eyes were the best because her blue eyes are perfect. They reflect the lamp light and tell me everything I need to know. She's worried about me and she's questioning me with those cerulean orbs so intently that I have to smile. "I love you."

She purses her lips. "And that's bothering you?"

"It makes me hot and bothered," I reply, grinning at her. "Is that what you're asking?"

"I don't ask questions with obvious answers." Reaching up, she rubs my cheek. "What's on your mind?"

I look back at the spot on the wall that held my attention so thoroughly for the past sixty minutes as if it can answer her question. I was so lost in thought that I can't pick any one out of my head. "This has been a really, really strange day."

She sits up, leaning across my lap so that her face is just a few inches from mine. Her hand moves to my shoulder and then I feel her fingers on my neck. "Is this about the patient that died this morning?"

"Not really." She blurs a little around the edges and I know that my own eyes are betraying my emotion. "I guess ... now that I have everything I've ever wanted ... I'm just more aware of the people who don't."

"Aww, baby." Her thumb moves under my eye and wipes away the moisture there. "We paid our dues to get here so don't feel bad that we finally got it right. For a long time, Cal, we were those people. I was living out here with a damn hateful dog and I didn't have anything to come home to. And you ... you were sleeping on Yang's couch and crying yourself to sleep at night -"

"Did she tell you that?"

"No. You told me that. I saw it on your face all the time."

"Did you?"

"Before I ever invited you out for drinks," she says, "I thought ... 'well, there's someone who looks just as lonely as me'. And you were beautiful, so damn beautiful and so damn sad ... I wanted to see you smile. I wanted to make you happy."

"You did so much more than that, Erica. You found me."

"No ... I found myself. In you."

She kisses me and it's long, slow, and sweet. Her tongue brushes against my bottom lip and I open my mouth, letting my own meet hers halfway. It feels like a first kiss ... something that makes your stomach flutter and your toes curl with anticipation. How in the world can it still feel so new? I've mapped every inch of her so many times that I could pick her out in a darkened room of a million other woman, but she can still take my breath without trying. One touch, one look, one whisper of her breath against my skin and I feel like I'm sixteen and life has really just begun. I feel young with her. I feel older and wiser. I feel weak and strong. I feel cracked, but never broken. I'm uneasy, but calm. How is that possible?

It's a mystery to me.

I never want to solve it.

Not knowing how she has such power over me means that I'll never be able to get rid of it.

She pulls away and I try to tug her back against me, but she stands up and extends her hand.

I look at it. I look at her long, milky fingers and her short, rounded nails. I look at the ruby eternity band and the watch that matches it so beautifully and then I look a little higher and I know that the real match ... is us. Her intention is perfectly clear in the dirty twinkle in her eyes and I put my hand in hers. She may as well be touching me between my legs because the feel of her courses through me and settles there and when I stand ... I'm aching so badly with need for her that I have to bite back the groan.

We walk down the hallway, past our photos, and I feel like I'm experiencing Ital and every other location we've ever been in together. It's exhilarating.

I've always heard that good sex starts in your head and words its way down and I think that theory is right.

When I close our bedroom door and watch her long t-shirt slide over her head ... I think I could come from the visuals alone. We argued over the shower when we got home and she won. I almost followed her, but I'm glad that I didn't. Because it would have been quick again and now ... now I know that I'd much rather take my time. As much as I love the blue panties ... there's something to be said for the black ones. I watch her hook her thumbs in the waist and slide them down, licking my lips in anticipation.

"You're overdressed, Cal."

I stop looking at her thighs and realize that my own are covered in snowmen. She's standing there naked and Venus-like and PERFECT and I have on snowmen flannel. I used to have the sexy thing down pat, but I think I've been so domesticated now that I've lost it. You can NOT undress flannel in a sexy way so I don't even try. I simply get rid of the pants as quickly as I can and then yank my shirt off. She's standing in front of me when it clears my head and her hand moves over my panties. Those? Are sexy. They're yellow and lacy and I bought them just for her ... and I know she likes them as she runs her palms over my backside and pulls me against her.

"I love you, too, by the way," she tells me, sliding one of her legs between mine.

I bite my bottom lip when her hands move to my hips and she pushes me down against her leg, urging me to rock back and forth just a little. Just enough. I lean into her, rubbing my bare breasts against hers and she hisses. I can feel hot wet I am and I know that she can. Her fingertips bite into my skin as she pushes and pulls my hips, sliding me over her leg and it's enough, but not enough. I want more. I need more. "Erica-"

She shifts and slides her hand between my legs, pushing aside the crotch of my panties. Her knuckle rubs against my clit as her mouth captures mine again. I cling to her face, her hair, anything I can reach as two of her fingers glide into me. My eyes close and my head falls back and she latches onto my neck, nipping, sucking and licking. She bites the tender skin over my clavicle and moves her face between the hollow of my breasts and I am so close ... I am right on the edge ... when she takes her hand away and smirks at me.

Why ... why did I have to fall for someone so diabolical?

She points at the bed and I start to take off my panties, but she stops me. "Leave them."

"Really not a good idea."

"Trust me."

I flop on the bed with my new yellow panties covering up what I would much rather have exposed and she kisses my knee, then my stomach. When she moves her head between my legs ... I really expect her to move my panties aside again, but she doesn't. She runs her tongue over the lace and ... oh ... my ... god. I have had clumsy fingers move over my panties and fumble around for the right spot, but she finds it without trying. Even though there's a thin barrier between us ... it feels AMAZING. I can feel me and her wetting my panties and it's warm, then cool when she blows against the lace. She sucks at the fabric and at me and the sound of it, the feel of it, the KNOWLEDGE that every time I put these panties on again ... she has marked them ... and me ... is enough.

I get off hard and fast and loud, crying out my release in the form of her name.

I'm still soaring when she slips my panties down my legs and runs her tongue the length of my cleft. It starts it all over again and another orgasm rocks through me. As I look down at her, watching her, I can see my left breast shaking over my tumultuous heartbeat. She follows my gaze and rests her hand over and I twine my fingers through hers. Whatever I want to say ... she knows it.

I'm still trembling when she moves over me. I open my mouth to invite her to sixty nine or to sit on my face or anything she wants, but she takes one of my legs and pulls it upward. I can only watch in amazement as she rises to one knee and positions her sex on mine. She's wet. I'm wet. And I push up on my elbows to watch as she rubs up and down, up and down. I can see that she's swollen with need, with anticipation, and when she grinds against me and hits MY spot ... I know that she's hitting hers, too.

It's so damn languid, almost lazy. She doesn't hurry, there's no rush. It's almost like she's sealing something as she pulls my leg a little higher and settles herself until we're so intimately pressed together that her heat becomes my heat and her body is part of mine. I watch her head fall back, I watch her throat constrict when she swallows and she continues to undulate, driving me out of my mind.

She doesn't verbally invite me to touch her, but she lifts herself off me just long enough for me to understand it.

I barely graze her clit with my thumb and she picks up the pace. The sound of our flesh rubbing together is quickly replaced by the sounds of it slapping together. Her hand covers mine a second later and she guides my fingers into her. She drops my leg, splaying her hands on my chest as she moves up and down, but I push them off and sit up, capturing her mouth as she rides my fingers. Her breasts bounces over mine and she wraps her legs around my waist. When she leans back a little, bracing her palm on the bed, I seize the opportunity to capture her nipple and worry it between my teeth.

That's all she needed.

That's the last little push.

And I keep pushing and pushing until we're spent.

It takes a while for either of us to start breathing normally again. She's on her back and I'm between her legs with my head resting on her stomach. Sleep is creeping up on us and I begrudgingly rise from the warmth of her body and lie beside her instead. She takes me into her arms and kisses the top of my head. "Callie?"

"Hmm?"

"You know how I said that I didn't want anything special for my birthday?"

"Yeah, but -"

"I changed my mind. I want to do this again. Exactly like this."

"Why wait?"

I hear her chuckle. "True."

Sleep ... doesn't have a chance of claiming either of us for a while.


	34. Chapter 34

Everyone fills their life with landmarks.

My parents used to stand all of us kids against the doorway to their bedroom and draw a line on the trim to measure how tall we were getting. Joel's mark was blue, mine was red, and Jasper's was green. Jazz used to stand in that doorway and trace the red marks with his fingers, never the blue. He would tell me that he was catching up with me as he stood on his tiptoes to touch the tallest red line that measured my inches. At ten years old, he could reach well past it and I'd always goose him in the ribs when he'd do it and tell him he was still 'the kid'. He would always be 'the kid'. I never knew ...

As I watch him now, while Derek attaches the electrodes to his head that will administer the first of the stimulating currents, I'm thinking about all of his landmarks. I was eleven when he walked for the first time and he didn't go to my father ... even though Dad has his arms outstretched ... he toddled to me. He had on a diaper and a little tank top that had a fire truck on it and when I scooped him into my arms ... I felt like I had walked for the first time. I can remember potty training, too, and my mother using every trick in the book to make Jazz cooperate. I think I was in high school before I realized that big boys do not aim their pee at Cheerios that are floating in the toilet.

And I think that's why I don't eat Cheerios to this day.

I can remember Jasper's first bicycle and running along beside him when the training wheels came off. I got to my baby brother first when he fell off and it was me that held a hand over his bleeding knee until the tears subsided. There wasn't a park in Miami that we didn't roll through together when he was finally skilled enough and anytime he challenged me to a race ... I let him win. I can remember when he lost his first tooth and the way he marveled at it. The first day of school, his first skateboard, his first pair of tie up sneakers (the ones that I painstakingly retied for him eight million times a day) when he kept tripping over them ... all of that is going through my head right now because we're at another landmark.

This one could kill him.

Once Derek starts the treatment ... Jasper could have another stroke.

The tiny sensors that have been implanted in his head could misfire and cause a fatal amount of bleeding.

Or they could have been placed just a little off the mark and Jazz could go blind, he could lose his ability to talk, walk, feed himself ... or BE.

Jasper doesn't know what's coming. He's sitting in the bed, propped up on a ton of pillows with his feet crossed at the ankles. It would be comical how relaxed he is, how happily he's chatting with Derek (who he calls Dirk) and Mark (who he STILL calls ass), if this wasn't possibly the final moments of his existence. My mother took a valium twenty minutes ago and offered one to me, but Erica gave her such a look that Mom withdrew the offer and surrendered the bottle to my father for safekeeping. I don't want a valium. I want Mark to move out of the way so that I can hold Jasper's hand through this thing ... whatever's coming. I need to be the person he has always reached for.

When I was researching the Fellman-Caputo technique I read all about the actual procedure, but not a lot about what patients go through during treatments. Derek filled in the blanks when he came in earlier. This is the trickiest part. If we don't get the response that we need with the frequency then Derek may have to go back into Jasper's head and relocate the sensors. If we get too much of a response, Jasper could be destroyed. Shepherd is going to be using the lowest setting and slowly working his way up and I take a little bit of comfort in that. But only a little. Starting out small isn't always the best thing really.

"We're ready to begin," Derek says, nodding at Mark.

I know why he chose Mark to be his 'wingman' here. Mark is strong enough to hold Jasper down if need be.

Please ... don't let him have to hold him down. I can handle a lot of things, but that's not one of them.

My parents move to the foot of the bed and Mom instinctively reaches out, resting her hand on Jasper's sock clad foot. I think there's something remarkably sad about a mother who will touch any part of their child they can at the end. I bet there are millions of mothers who have lost their children that would love the opportunity to stand by their side, or at their feet, when they slip away ... and now I've made myself cry. I discreetly wipe my eyes, but Jasper sees it and his smile fades.

"Wrong, Lee?"

"Nothing, buddy."

Erica, who has been standing to my right, moves behind me and wraps her arms around my waist. She puts her chin on my shoulder and whispers, "It's okay, baby."

For the first time since I woke up today ... I relax a little. It's impossible not to when she's around. I force myself to think of my own personal (and best) landmark for a few seconds ... I came out of the closet and I'm fine. I turned my life upside down and inside out to be with her and it's worth it. I rest my hands on top of hers and she threads our fingers, tightening her grip when Derek clicks the machine on and it loudly whirs to life. I hate the sound of it. I hate knowing that it's going to do something ... and not knowing for sure what that something is. Derek, who came in on his off day for this, turns down the collar of his shirt and smoothes a small wrinkle in his sweater ... I wonder if that's a nervous habit. We all have them. I'd be wringing my hands if Erica wasn't clutching them so tightly.

This is it.

I feel her press her lips against my neck so I rub my thumb over the back of her hand to let her know I'm fine.

I'm being as strong as I can possibly be.

Everyone in the room is holding their breath.

I know I am.

And I don't hear Erica's.

Jasper closes his eyes and then scrunches them tightly, slowly turning his head left and right. I keep my eyes on him, but I can see that Derek is turning up the frequency and in tandem, Jasper's head shakes a little harder and he makes a noise in the back of his throat. He can feel it. He can feel the tiny jolts and it probably feels like a bee sting to the brain. The tissue that has been damaged for fifteen years is firing for the first time and like a rusty car that bangs to life in a junkyard ... it could backfire. Badly. I glance at Derek's hand and see that he's moving to the third (of ten) levels.

"Ow." Jasper rubs the sides of his head, still shaking it like he wants to dislodge water in his ear. "Head hurt."

Across the expanse of the bed, Derek's eyes meet mine. I see a determination there that makes me remember the day I tried to stare him down. I won. And I do the same thing now, only I nod at him and he pushes the dial to four. Almost halfway to full mast and Jasper ... screams. His hands flail out, his knees go up to his chest, and he screams in a way that I've never heard in my life. It renders me completely immobile. I should be the one comforting him, not Mark. I should be the one talking softly to him, not Mark. I should be the one holding him against me, not Mark ... but it IS Mark doing all of those things while I stand there in shock.

Jasper has found a long silent voice.

And has used it to cut through me like a dull knife.

"Stop it!" Mom says, suddenly. "Stop it, Dr. Shepherd!"

"Lori Anne, hush," Dad tells her and he's holding onto her the same way that Erica is holding me.

That's when I realize that I'm struggling, too.

And I stop.

"OW! HURTING ME!" Jasper bellows, his voice full of venom and aggravation. His fingers are hooks now and he's clawing at his head hard enough to pop one of the stitches. I watch it open and blood trickle down over his ear. It soaks into the front of Mark's shirt and then ... then Jasper starts to cry. It's the first time that I've heard him cry since the before the accident. There are harsh, wracking sobs that accompany his tears and it takes me a moment to realize that the whirring of the machine has stopped. It's over.

But it's not. Jasper is choking and he ... he's ANGRY. He knows what has hurt him because he grabs for the electrodes and snatches them loose in one, mighty fell swoop, casting aside the cords like it's something dirty. His pillow is thrown next and Derek catches it, depositing it at the foot of the bed, but my brother's thrashing prevents it from staying there long.

"Jasper, settle down," my father says and it's the same stern voice he used on me at lunch when he told me exactly what he thought of my drug induced coma. Jasper doesn't register the command. This isn't the same obedient Jasper who went to sleep. This is the Jasper who woke up and ... woke up. Can I really let myself believe that he wake woken up? Even a little.

"Ass!" Jasper yells at Mark, striking at his shoulders. "You!"

"Take it easy, buddy," Mark tells him, rubbing his arm.

"I NOT YOUR BUDDY!" Jazz bellows, veins straining in his neck. "GO WAY!"

I once had a snow globe in my room and I'd shake it up to watch the storm inside because ... in Miami ... it never snowed. I'd hold it upside down until everything was calm and then I'd flip it over and stare at the little house inside until white flakes had gathered on the roof and yard. Watching my brother now ... it's like he was living in a snow globe and has been upside down forever. And Derek has righted him and this storm ... this tornado ... this lightning bolt of rage has been fifteen years in the making. The tantrum that he had in Miami on his birthday is nothing compared to this. I watch his strong, sinewy arms flail maddeningly at anyone nearby and I take a moment, just the smallest of respites, to enjoy it.

I wanted my brother back and this feels like a giant leap in the right direction.

He kicks one foot out, coming close to clipping my mother in the face and I finally react. I've enjoyed it long enough. It's time to reign in the emotion that has been tapped down, shut out, and silenced for far too long.

"Jazz," I begin softly. "It's-"

"Lee!" he wails, staring at me with wide eyes over Mark's shoulder. "They're hurting me!"

Complete sentence. Correctly worded. And I register this fact as I break loose from Erica and pull Mark out of the way. Jasper reaches for me before I can touch him and actually climbs to his knees like he's going to leap into my arms. I don't let him leap, but I grab him and hug him with all the welcoming I've had bottled up inside me as well. If this is a new version of Jasper ... I want him to know that my arms are open ... no matter how cracked down the middle he may still be. I've seen a lot of things in my career, but when I look up and realize that Derek Shepherd actually has tears in his eyes ... I don't know what to make of it. Jazz is trembling against me and I'm terrified that Derek is about to tell me that it's a bust, that we failed, but he doesn't. He just stands and watches me, watches Jazz, and waits.

Both of Jasper's arms are around my neck and his face is buried against my hair when Mark speaks from behind me. "Callie, I'm putting something in his IV for pain right now. Hold him still."

"Jazz?" I rub a circle on his back and even though he doesn't fit in my arms the same way that Emma Foster does ... he still belongs there. He's still the baby, the toddler, the little leaguer and the not quite man who slipped into the water and MAY be coming back. "It'll be over in just a second, buddy."

"Don't go, Lee."

"I'm not going anywhere."

"No schoo?"

"I don't have school anymore. I finished."

"I finish, too," he sniffles. "No more hurt."

"Not today," I reply.

My mother is crying softly into her handkerchief like every polite Southern woman knows to do and I watch Erica hug her. My eyes widen at the lack of reproach in mom's face as she returns the hug and I don't know what Erica is saying to her, but Mom nods and pats her on the cheek. Dad isn't watching the exchange ... his eyes are fastened to me and Jasper like we're on a life raft in a hurricane and if he blinks ... a wave could take us. "What happens now?" he asks Derek. "What does this ... reaction ... mean?"

"It could mean nothing," Derek replies honestly. "Or it could mean everything."

Mark groans behind us. "And that is why I didn't go into neuro. Derek, that was the shittiest answer I've ever heard."

"Shittest!" Jasper parrots, sobbing. "Answer shitted!"

"That's a bad word," I tell him. "Don't say it again."

"Shit. Tid."

"Jazz," I warn. "Stop that."

"They hurted me!"

"They didn't mean to."

"Shits," he whispers. "Bad, bad shits."

His broad shoulders are quaking, his heart rate is elevated, and his strong arms are nearly choking the life out of me, but I still cling to him. Maybe I'm holding on hard enough to choke the life out of him because it doesn't take long for his grip to loosen and his sniffles to eventually subside. When one of his arms falls away, Derek reaches forward and eases my brother back into bed. The last time I witnessed such a red face on Jazz was when my mother told him he couldn't go to the movies because of his math grade. There was a tantrum the likes of which I had NEVER seen ... and then we snuck out together and I spent my allowance on the movie for both of us.

With heavily lidded eyes, Jazz looks at Shepherd, pointing a finger. "You are mean."

"I'm sorry, Jasper," Derek replies. I can hear the thick emotion in his voice as he puts a hand on Jasper's chest. He's sorry for not being able to give us a definitive answer on what it all means. You can't cut and dry it that way. No two brains are REALLY alike. What works for specimen A may not work for specimen C, but specimen B may astound you. I want Jazz to be astounding. "You did very well today."

"I don't like you, Dirk!" Jasper yells, shoving Derek's arm. "Go away!"

I can't help it. I actually grin and when I look up ... Derek's doing the same thing.

Petulant behavior ... is an improvement.

That's more than I could have hoped for after one treatment.

The brain is an amazing thing.

But I refuse to get my hopes up just yet.

Derek and Mark eventually leave us and Jasper falls asleep. I dry his face, trying to smooth away the frown line on his brow. I've gotten hold of my frayed emotions and have them firmly in check when the door eases open and Cristina appears. She looks nervously around the room, nodding at my parents and finally her eyes find mine. "Callie?"

"What is it?" I ask.

I watch her gaze flit toward Erica and then back to me. "Uhm ... Izzie ... she's ... well, she's just a few doors down and she heard Jasper yelling and ... Dr. Montgomery doesn't want her to be on her feet so much, but she's been standing out there in the hallway for thirty minutes and ... can she come in?"

"Why would Stevens-" Erica begins.

"I'll explain later," I cut her off. "It's fine, Cristina. Bring her in."

Erica looks at me, eyes huge. "What the hell is -"

"Later," I repeat. Somehow ... telling her about Jasper and Izzie in the chapel completely slipped my mind. "It's okay."

Stevens doesn't look nervously around the room or as if she's intruding at all when Cristina leads her in. She's still walking slightly bent and her portable IV makes a racket as it rolls across the floor. There are no apologies or urgings to be quiet. My parents are so wrapped up in one another that they barely register her and that's not necessarily a bad thing. Her hair is oily and slicked away from her face in a tight bun. She's been crying again and the fresh moisture on her cheeks makes me believe that maybe hearing Jasper gave her something new to be upset over and that gives me an odd measure of comfort. Jasper's eyes flutter open when the wheels of the IV clang against the wheels on his bed and he looks startled for just a moment, then he smiles when he sees Izzie. "Hey, ZZ."

"Hey, Jasper." She takes the hand he holds up, clutching it in both of hers. "Does it hurt?"

He considers his answer, possibly taking stock of himself for phantom aches and pains. "Not no more."

"Good."

"You still sad, ZZ?"

"Not right now. I'm happy to see you."

He grins at her and I bite my bottom lip because it's a grin that's playful and full of the old Jasper; it's a grin that used to be reserved for only me. "See me all time, ZZ. You can."

Erica shuffles her feet just a little and I warily look her way. She doesn't like this new friendship at all and she's barely holding back the need to say so. Her eyes find mine and I shake my head, pleading with her not to do the brutally honest thing she does so well. It works. She turns and looks out the window and I pretend that plucking dead leaves from Jasper's numerous flower arrangements is the most important thing I've ever done.

Izzie isn't crying now.

And part of me hates and respects the nerve she has to walk into this room and pretend that an ocean of wrong doing does exist between us.

Mark Sloan has never been one to keep his opinion to himself. Ever. So I'm shocked a while later when he answers my question about Jasper's condition by glaring at me and stalking away. I catch him in the stairwell and he shakes my hand off his arm with a little more intensity than he's ever used before. I nearly lose my balance and he doesn't try to help me. He doesn't do anything except slam both of his palms against the wall several times. The sound of it echoes around us and causes a certificate from the fire department to clatter to the ground. The glass frame shatters, but it doesn't deter him. He hits the wall two more times before he turns and walks toward me. So help me God ... I back up because he has me terrified. Even at my worst ... I never caused such a flash of unbridled furor to contort his handsome features.

"Did you know?" he demands. "DID YOU KNOW!?"

"Know what?" I cry, my back against the wall. He's so big. Why did I never notice how big he is? It's intimidating.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about, Callie!" he yells. "Addison's pregnant!"

Oh. I had actually put that out of my mind for the time being. I willingly handle one crisis per day and Jasper got this one. "It wasn't my place to tell you."

"It obviously wasn't hers either because I heard about it from one of the nurses."

"Please tell me that you weren't having sex with her when she told you."

"No, I wasn't, but thank you for assuming the worst."

"Just the other day you were lamenting your lack of sex. What am I supposed to think?"

"Is she going to abort this one, too?"

I alone probably know what making that statement so baldly has cost him. He never, ever refers to his lost child as 'aborted'. He always calls that baby 'lost'. I think maybe he's lost in that same abyss. He turns away from me and I breathe a little easier. I feel like a chicken who had her head on the chopping block and now they've let me go. I clear my throat and say, "I'm still Switzerland. I'm not involved."

"Someone has to be involved! I can't do this!" He kicks a piece of the picture frame across the floor. "She drives me absolutely insane! I don't even like her half the time because she's neurotic, passive aggressive, hateful, and - Addison. She's Addison."

"You're right," I agree. "She is."

I walk around the glass shards and sit down on the stairwell, patting the spot beside me. Mark looks like I'm asking him to reach into a basket and pull out a King Cobra, but he relents when I give him the eyebrow of doom. My mother taught me how to do it. It can make anyone bend to my will ... except Erica. When I try to do it to her she just pokes it and laughs at me. When he flops down next to me and rests his elbows on his knees, I say, "She is neurotic. She's also passive aggressive, hateful, and a little bit crazy, but she's Addison. She's the same Addison that you were willing to lose your best friend over, Mark. She's the same Addison that you followed out here and then mourned like the dead when she moved to California. And you wouldn't love her nearly as much if she didn't drive you absolutely insane."

He props his chin on his fist and sighs. "Shut up."

"Can't stand the voice of reason?"

"Can't stand being Switzerland?" he retorts.

"Ouch."

Another sigh escapes his parted lips. "She does drive me insane."

"And?"

"And I want to hate her."

"But?"

"Switzerland isn't usually this vocal, you know?"

He has no idea. Switzerland could tell him that the baby may not be his ... but Switzerland is definitely, absolutely, positively and unequivocally remaining neutral in that regard. There are some things you just don't get involved in, some things you do not say, some things you carry inside even when you can feel it trying to claw to the surface. "You should talk to her," I finally advise. "Cease fire."

"She slept with Karev. Recently!"

"And you know what? You slept with someone in New York. You cheated on her. Now you know why she left you."

A look of pure scandalized outrage flashes across his face and then his features soften a little. In cartoons ... this is the part where the light bulb goes on over someone's head. I actually glance up to see it for myself now, but all I see if the light bouncing off his graying hair. I've lost sleep over how many of those I've put there. He catches me looking and scratches his chin. "Maybe it's possible that I never thought about it that way."

"Maybe it's possible that you should."

I hear Addison's heels on the stairs before I see her. As far as I can tell she's the only female doctor on staff who wears them on a regular basis. I find myself wondering what she'll be wearing once her ankles start to swell. Probably Crocs. Or sneakers. I can't even imagine Addison Forbes Montgomery CHOOSING to wear sneakers all day. I give her a winning smile when she sees the shattered picture frame on the ground and steps over it. "Hey, Addy."

She points at the mess and I find myself wondering how much time she spent on her curls that morning. Her red hair is a cascade of fiery waves of her shoulder. She's beautiful and she obviously has her own eyebrow of doom because it goes up a fraction of the inch when she asks, "Did either of you geniuses think to call housekeeping for this?"

I shake my head and point at Mark with my thumb. "That genius did it. Not me."

Addison's hand goes to her narrow hip, pushing aside her white lab coat. I tilt my head a little, gazing at her flat stomach. She's wearing a form fitting pencil skirt and it's hard to imagine her body filling out to accommodate a baby. I can't even picture it and I have a fairly vivid imagination. Will she be one of those women whose weight spreads out all over her body, softening and curving it a little more? Or will she be the skinny woman who wears the baby like a basketball under her Chanel shirt and size four, elastic waisted jeans. Probably the latter ... because Addison has a tendency to do things to the enviable extreme.

"What are you looking at?" she snaps at me, coming very close to whacking me on the nose with the roll of papers in her hand.

I give her a playful grin. "Is that skirt Marc Jacobs?"

She gasps. "Oh my god! How did you know!?"

It's just a lucky guess on my part and I only said it because I had nothing else to offer. "Because no one wears that quite like you," I reply innocently. "You look gorgeous."

It works. A smile lights up her features and she glances down at her outfit. "Stop flirting with me, Torres. I already told you no."

"Damn. I'm wounded," I reply, resting a hand on my heart. I glance at Mark and say, "I'll send someone to clean this up in ... oh ... fifteen minutes?"

"Suave, Callie. Very suave and subtle." Mark narrows his eyes menacingly, but the burning rage was effectively extinguished by Addison's arrival and if I didn't know better ... a spark of hope has reared itself up in its wake. He's not looking at me now ... he's looking at Addison's stomach the same way I did. I can only imagine what he's thinking.

I catch Addison's eye and give her my most convincing look of 'please do not kill him while my back is turned' and she quirks on side of her mouth in acquiescence. There's a river of wrong between them with heavy, heavy currents and rapids, but I think if they fight TOWARD each other and meet somewhere in the middle ... the life raft that saves them will be one of their own making. Those are the best ones, too. Because they're carefully crafted and built to weather anything. I know all about them ... I still have the splinters from the one I put together with Erica.

And it's worth it.

It's oh so worth it in the end.

Erica's shift ends before mine. I find her in Jasper's room and he's got his finger on top of a ribbon as she ties a neat little bow on a package. I lean against the doorway and watch the gentle struggle to disengage him from the fancy wrapping. When he's finally free, she hands him the gift and he turns it over so delicately in his usually clumsy hands that a lump forms in my throat. I want to believe that there really are changes in him after one treatment. I want to see something new in every action he takes and hear a new voice with every word, but it's my heart doing it. It's not medicine. This isn't the way that medicine works and the part of me that is a sister and the part of me that is a doctor refuse to shakes hands and return to their corners. They keep boxing in my head and it's exhausting me.

"Hey, Lee!" Jazz holds up the present. "Look! Yellow did it! For ZZ."

Well, that's new.

I paste a smile on my face. "Did you get something for Izzie?"

He nods like a toddler who has been asked if he likes chocolate ice cream and the doctor in my head delivers a one-two punch to the sister. She sways on her feet, but hangs onto the rope for balance. He's still the same broken little boy, I suppose. It's only one treatment. Jazz holds out the small box and says, "Beads broke. In the church."

"She broke her rosary," Erica translates. "I was walking him around in the hallway when it happened."

"Broke," Jazz repeats. "I gived her Daddy's. Right here. In box."

That doesn't sound right at all. My father's rosary beads are as sacred to him as anything could be. "Are - are you sure that-"

Erica pretty much reads my mind. She's good at that. "Your father said he had a spare. I - I kinda think he went and bought them because I can't imagine Santos having spare pink beads. Even if he doesn't like you and me."

"Or fancy silver gift wrapping." I return the box to Jasper and he grabs the bed rail, shaking it. "What are you doing, buddy?"

"I go see ZZ now."

Oh, shit. There's no one to run interference. No one to do it for us. My parents are at the Archfield. Yang headed out earlier. George is probably off doing God knows what with Lexie and I think I saw Meredith and Derek leave together. So, it boils down to me telling him no or taking him to Izzie's room. And how can I possibly say no?

Part of me wonders if I have the strength to waltz into her room the way she confidently danced into Jasper's. If it's remotely possibly ... I feel wrong for not forgiving her that day at Joe's when she attempted to apologize. If she had died --

No, I can't think of that. Well, I technically can, but I refuse.

"I can take him," Erica offers, sliding the rail down and retrieving his slippers.

"Why don't we both take him?" I suggest and that's what we do.

We're that holy trinity that we became on the beach again. We both hold his hands as we head down the hallway toward Izzie's room and what I want more than anything is to be able to sit him down eventually and tell him the story of how I came to be with Erica. I want him to laugh in the right places and turn a little crimson when he realizes that being with Erica literally means we are together in every way imaginable. I want to tell him about how scared I was in Italy before I asked her to marry me and take him skydiving so he can experience the same rush I still get when I settle into her arms. I greedily want it all. There's so much that I've got to say to him when (not if) he comes back complete.

I knock so softly on Izzie's door that I almost hope she won't hear it so that I can say she's sleeping, but that's not the case. I hear her call out for us to come in and I swear to GOD I can feel Jasper vibrating with excitement. I go in first and something clouds across Stevens' features that isn't quite confusion, but it's not an angry need to scream at me either. She opens her mouth to say something, then closes it again when she sees Jazz. It's not about me or whatever barb wired battlefield stretches across us. It's not about the land mines we've set or the aggravation we've caused each other ... it's about Jasper and he's too damn innocent to know about any of that.

And really ... how can I still despise someone whose face changes just like mine when Jasper walks into the room.

I never thought Izzie Stevens was beautiful ... until right now.

"Hey, Jasper."

Erica pushes the portable drip along behind him and I wonder if we should leave the room. I wonder if I should give them some measure of privacy, but knowing Jazz the way I do ... I'd come back in to find him sitting on Stevens' lap and that's the last thing she needs.

"Look, ZZ! For you! Open it!" Jasper's voice is urgent and excited, but he carefully puts the package in her lap as if he knows that she's one stiff wind from blowing away completely. "Like it?"

I realize that Erica has joined me at the window and we're less than mesmerized by the view of the dumpsters, but we act spellbound all the same. I hear Izzie exclaim over the pretty bow and Jasper tell her that he 'tie-ded' it and then the paper tears and it's like a splash of scalding water against my back. That's apparently what hate feels like when it leaves your body, by the way. Because I don't have an ounce ... even a fragment ... of hatred left in me for this woman. Erica's fingers wind through mine and I know that she has seen the tears in my eyes that I am fighting valiantly to control, but she doesn't speak.

Behind us, Izzie gasps and the roll of beads over cardboard tells me that she's clutching her rosary at last. One that my Dad chose for her. One that's pink and girly and beautiful ... like her. But this one isn't broken ... like her. I used to lie awake at night and watch George sleep. His eyes would move back and forth under his lids and sometimes a ghost of a smile would curve his lips and I'd know that whatever he was seeing in that faraway dream ... Izzie Stevens was there. I guess maybe ... for the first time ... I can see why.

"You no like it?" Jasper asks and the concern in his voice makes me turn around.

Izzie has her head down and she's crying softly, her hands clasped together under her chin with the beads spilling out like her pain. I swallow down the lump in my throat, choking on it, as I let Erica's hand go and move across the room. When I put my hand on her shoulder ... the 'I'm sorry' that I want to say doesn't come out. Her brown eyes meet mine and I flash through our past ...

/

"Please ... give me back my husband."

"You keep saying that like it means something. It's just a piece of paper."

"You thought I wanted to fight you? I - I wanted to talk."

"Don't come to me for forgiveness, you traitorous bitch."

"We're women, Izzie, you did this to another woman."

/

"Callie-"

The second she says my name I bend down and hug her. Imagine that. The girl who ate her own hair hugging the fashion model ... but the truth is ... the stunning, eye opening and weird twist is ... we probably would have found each other in high school. One pretty, pregnant loner and one chubby, unwanted overachiever. Oh, the lunches we could have had, the sleep overs we could have shared, the friendship we both needed could have been ours.

There's a life raft to be built here as well, I think, because this river is still scalding me, but it's flipping us over and under and inside out, too. "I forgive you," I whisper. "And Alex would not want you to do this to yourself. You need to get your ass out of this bed and walk in the halls with Jasper because he needs a friend. And so do you."

Izzie Stevens is not weak. She clings to me with so much power that I'm staggered by it.

Even when I leave Jasper in her capable hands and she assures me that she'll take him back to his room ... I'm staggered by it. I stand at the end of the hallway, my arm around Erica's waist, and watch them walk into the chapel together. Jasper waves at me and it's a heart rending experience to know that the surgery to fix him ... will inevitably cut me out of his life. I will no longer be his number one. I won't be his best friend. I won't be his everything ... because there's a 'Yellow' out there for him, too. The scalpel that worked on his brain will put someone else in his heart ... it will teach him what love really is.

"Let's go to Joe's," Erica says. "You look like you could use a game of darts."

I smile at her. "Just like old times, huh?"

"I still won't let you beat me."

"I just haven't stepped up my game. I'll take you down."

"Is that a threat or a promise?" The smirk she gives me says that she already knows the answer, but I play along.

"I don't make threats, Dr. Hahn."

"Is that right, Dr. Torres? What do you make?"

It's too easy. "Love?"

"Sap," she tells me as we board the elevator.

"I do have a tendency to go all 'poufy and -"

"Oh, look," she says, as the elevator doors open. "A pillow. I could smother you."

Addison appears in the doorway suddenly. "I'll help."

My eyes widen as I take in her flustered appearance. "I did not tell him that you're pregnant. Addison-"

"Well, I told him that it may not be his." Addison adjusts the strap of her purse and punches the bottom level button a little harder than she should. "Are we completely sure that getting drunk is a bad idea when you're pregnant?"

"Yes," Erica and I both assure her.

"But darts have been known to help," Erica adds. "Wanna come to Joe's?"

"Only if I can buy you both a few rounds and live vicariously. I'll even play designated driver," she replies, defeated. "He didn't take it well."

"I'm sorry." I tell her, rubbing her arm. "What do you think he's going to do?"

"I wish I knew," Addison says.

We walk through the lobby together and cross the parking lot, heading to Joe's on foot. It's cold as HELL for September and I'm shivering by the time we finally make it into the warmth of the Emerald City Bar. Joe bellows a greeting from his spot near the cash register and I cringe when I see Mark. He's sitting at the bar, back toward me, but his eyes are on Addison in the mirror. I take off my jacket and drape it over a chair at a table in the corner. "I'll make the first run. What do you want?"

With their orders tucked in my head, I make my way through the unusually crowded building and sit down on the stool next to Mark's. There are four upside down shot glasses in front of him and one that hasn't been touched. I reach around him and pick it up, drinking it down before he can protest. It's a shock when he doesn't say anything at all. Joe arrives and I make small talk about his kids and fawn over a new photo before I place our order.

"She should be drinking water," Mark says, scowling at the Sprite that Joe sets down in front of me. "Too much carbonation can-"

"It's the only thing that settles her stomach," I tell him, draining my shot of bourbon the second that Joe puts it in front of me. He refills it without my having to ask. "And, Mark, I realize that this may not be your kid, but it MAY BE. Keep that in mind."

"Stop giving me advice," he snaps. "I don't even like Switzerland."

"I'm fairly certain you've never been there. I saw your passport ... so you don't know."

Mark kicks my shot back and grits his teeth against the bitterness. He sets it down a little harder than he should on the bar and a few people glance our way. In the mirror, I can see that Addison and Erica are also intrigued. He turns his head towards me and I expect an outburst or an insult because his eyes may be a little glassier than I'd like to see, but instead, his voice is whisper soft. "What am I supposed to do? What if it's not mine? What if it's his?"

"What if it's yours?"

"What do I do?"

"What do you want to do?"

"Stop answering me with questions!" he demands loudly.

"Then answer them yourself! What do you want to do, Mark?"

He slowly moves around and now he's openly staring at Addison. For her part, she tries to look like she's busily searching for something in her purse, but when it's the size of a zip lock bag ... that's really not the most believable thing to do. She looks back at him within seconds and there's a sad longing there that I hate to see. I recognize it well. It stared me in the face the entire time I tried to live without Erica. I nudge him with the toe of my boot. "Here's a novel concept ... why don't you ask Addison to drive you home? You've had too much to drink and -"

He's off the stool before I can even finish and I watch him pick up his leather coat and slide it on. Holding my breath, I fear that he will walk past her, but he doesn't. Whatever he says apparently works because she nods at him twice and then takes the hand he holds out. I watch them go with just a hint of smug satisfaction because who the hell knows what will happen once they're alone, but it's a start. It's a step in the right direction.

And speaking of steps in the right direction ... Erica abandons our table and walks toward me. It's amazing, really. She's walking toward me like any normal person would, but there's something predatory and emboldened in her smile. I'm caught. She has me. Whatever she wants to do next is perfectly fine with me. I tilt my face up as she reaches past me and picks up her glass of wine. I'm close enough to hear her swallow the first sip and I hook one foot behind her leg, pulling her a little nearer. "Erica?"

She looks down at me, clearly amused. "Yes, Cal?"

"Do you really want to play darts or would you rather go home?"

"We have no social life. You do realize that, don't you?"

"But our sex life is thriving," I point out. "I don't know about your priorities, but sex trumps social in mine. And ... I do have on yellow panties."

A little of her champagne spills out and I smugly exhale on my nails, rubbing them on my chest like I just accomplished something amazing. She swats me on the leg, puts her glass down, and pays our tab. In a random act of kindness ... she also covers Mark's and I figure he must have said something pretty fucking amazing to Addison while ago. In the car, she turns the heat up, but the fact that she carefully adjusts one of the blowers in my direction warms me more than anything else could. I lace my fingers through hers as she navigates the streets and pull my seat belt off the minute we're safely in the driveway.

She cackles when I climb over the console and kiss her. It's rare to draw that kind of reaction from her because she can be unrelentingly taciturn when she wants to be, but she gives in now. The warm, glowing, affectionate woman that I fell in love with slams the breaks hard enough to cause my back to hit the steering wheel and blare the horn, but we don't care. I wore one of her button down shirts today and she grabs it, ripping it open and sending buttons flying. It transmits a wicked tingle through me and I kiss her, pulling her face upward so that I can caress every inch of it.

Her fingers dance along my arms and under the straps of my bra, which she pulls down. When my nipple is in her mouth and my hands are in her hair ... I let my head fall back.

This is what life is all about. God, the things I missed out on by being an ugly, homely, gangly teenager.

I feel her nimble fingers at the waist of my pants and I help her with the button because I need to feel her all over me and the short distance it would take to make it to the house is the distance between life and death ... captivity and release. She has to release me.

"Callie-" she moans, her mouth against mine.

I reach down and tug at her sweater, pulling it over her head and letting it fall into the backseat. She leans forward so that I can unfasten her bra and I make quick work of it, slinging it into the passenger seat I just vacated. As I fondle her hardened nipples, she closes her mouth around mine again and I lean down, trying like hell to ease her seat back. I finally find the button and moan a little as the seat slowly glides backward, taking me away from the steering wheel. Her hand joins mine in the space between the seat and door and she flips the lever that lets the back of her seat recline. I smile wickedly, moving fully over her, my knees on either side of her thighs as I shove my shirt off and toss it.

I've never hated pants more in my life.

We need to become skirt wearers.

Long, flowing skirt wearers.

Like the Evangelicals that I knew in Miami ... only with more sin.

I really, really need more sin.

There's a scraping, crunching metallic sound that seems to emanate from nowhere, but reverberates everywhere. I sit up fast, looking around wildly. Erica sits up, too, so quickly that she head butts me in the mouth. I cup my throbbing lip with both hands as she yanks up the emergency break. It takes me a second to realize that we've driven into the tall hedges that separate our yard from the neighbors and our headlights are shining right into their house. "Oh shit!" I cry, scrambling back over the console.

I feel around for my shirt and reach behind the driver's seat for Erica's sweater. She's sitting so far away from the steering wheel that she can't reach it. She's simply holding her arms out toward it like a cemetery angel reaching heavenward. I can't help it. I start to laugh. I laugh so hard and with such carefree abandon that I don't even care that it sounds maniacal. Her mouth is agape, her hair is a ruffled mess, and the fact that we're in the bushes (no pun intended, really) is possibly the funniest thing I've ever experienced. When she finally looks at me ... her eyes are as round as her mouth. "You're crazy," she says. "A fucking lunatic."

"You're the naked one," I retort, finishing up the last button on my shirt.

She gasps as pulls her sweater on ... backwards ... but I don't tell her that. Instead, I hang on for dear life as she attempts to back us out of the shrubbery that seems to have a death grip on us. I start to laugh again when the car rocks back and forth. "It's like the Whomping Willow ... only smaller," I say.

"How much did you drink?" she demands, throwing her hands in the air. "It's no use! And oh god ... here comes Mr. Lassiter. That nosey old bastard will call neighborhood watch for sure."

Sure enough, our neighbor, his wife, and their two teenage sons are making their way toward us with a flashlight. Thank God it's dark. I catch a glimpse of Erica's bra on the dash and grab it, stuffing it under my shirt. The potential for humiliation is strong with this one.

By the time we crawl out of the back of the SUV (because the hedges have pinned the doors) ... we've convinced our neighbors, the man driving the wrecker, and each other that we had to swerve to avoid a deer.

I swear it was this big.

Love always is.

An hour later I finally convince Erica that the ice pack on my lip has done enough and we shower, then stand at the sink together while I survey the damage. I make a pretty pout in the mirror as she looks on behind me, then I smile. It stings a little to do that because the tiny little cut she gave me pulls angrily. I stop grinning and say, "Angelina ain't got nothing on me."

"She never did," Erica replies, resting her head on my shoulder. "Are you sure you're okay? You've got a bruise on your back."

I turn and study my back in the mirror. "That happened before you drove us into Labyrinth and we didn't even get to meet David Bowie."

Erica shakes her head. "You are the oddest person -"

"I prefer queer."

She gingerly kisses my swollen lip. "Ha ha."

"You know," I tell her. "I'm naked and you're naked ... and the bed is just right in there so -"

"Give me four minutes," she tells me. "I'm going to go plug my phone up so it can charge and check the messages."

"You expecting a call?" I ask.

She falters just a little and bites her bottom lip. "I - I, uh, gave my - my- ... father ... the house number so he could leave his flight information. Just in case my phone wasn't working."

Her phone is always working, but I don't point that out. And the fact that she has checked her Blackberry three hundred times in the past few days proves that she's hoping that her father has left a message on the answering machine. I hope for her sake that he has. Because I'll find and kill the mother fucker if he hurts her any more than he already has. I stare at my reflection and see that my eyebrow of doom is threatening to leap off my face and have to smile at it. I'm so easy to read.

I pick up a bottle of my cherry blossom lotion and sit down, naked, on the bed to slather it on. Winter weather dries my skin out to the point of pain and I'm liberally rubbing my elbows when Erica walks back in, equally naked. I take just a second to enjoy the way her thigh muscles ripple with her movements before I lazily look over the rest of her. I think I stare at her breasts for a full minute before I realize how heavy she's breathing.

Shit, this lotion is magic.

"Callie!"

My name comes out venomously, suggesting that she must have said it more than once to get my attention. I stop massaging my elbow. "Huh?"

"We received a fax!"

A shower of papers comes down on the bed around me, too many to count. I pick up the one nearest my knee and skim the contents. It's a bank statement of some kind and it makes no sense to me so I pick up another sheet and scan through it as well. This one is a little more interesting. And it has a name attached to it.

And a mug shot.

Erica's father is a handsome man, even staring out at me from a black and white photo. His shocking white hair was probably blond in his youth and the booking information lists his eyes as blue. He's tall as well, six foot three to be exact. I glance down at the arrest date and see that it was four years ago and the charge was 'assault'. I pick up yet another paper and there are black and white (and slightly distorted) photos of the same white haired man kissing a tall, statuesque woman on the cheek. It's a newspaper clipping and when I read the caption ... my heart stops beating.

'Judge Rick Salinger gives daughter Vivian a kiss on her wedding day. Salinger reportedly spared no expense for his only daughter's big day, which included a horse drawn carriage and a gown with imported crystals and ivory beads.'

Only daughter.

Vivian.

Not Erica.

I glance upward, expecting to feel the weight of Erica's hurt in her gaze, but that's not what I see.

Instead ... I see anger.

At me.

"You did this," she accuses, but it's not really an accusation. It's the truth and we both know it. "Who did you tell?"

"I - I asked my dad to -"

"YOUR DAD!?" Erica yells. "Great, Callie! Just fucking perfect! Like Lori Anne needs another reason to hate me!"

"Why would she -"

"Who wants their kid to be with a bastard!?"

"You're not a -"

"How could you tell Santos!?" She's still furious, but now she's crying. "The things I told you - I - I told you that in confidence. You had no right to - and this is an invasion of my father's privacy."

"Erica-"

"WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS!?"

"TO PROTECT YOU!"

"You throw your money around and dig up everything you can on -"

"THIS IS NOT ABOUT MY MONEY!" I yell and I hate that wealth is such an easy button to push on me. "THIS IS ABOUT YOU AND A COMPLETE STRANGER WHO FOUND MY NOTE! I JUST WANTED TO MAKE SURE HE WAS WHO HE CLAIMED TO BE!! I DIDN'T WANT YOU TO BE HURT!"

"WELL IT BACKFIRED!" she screams. "DON'T YOU EVER, EVER STICK YOUR NOSE IN MY BUSINESS AGAIN!"

Okay, that really couldn't have hurt worse if she had punctuated every word with a whip. "You are my business."

"Not anymore."

I let the paper fall from my hand and stand up. There's a vague part of me that hates being naked and exposed and completely bare, but at least my body is not alone in that state. My heart is the same way. "You - you don't mean that."

I don't even recognize my own voice when I say it and she's not looking at me anymore. She's staring at the closet and I translate that she's silently telling me to pack my things and go. In an act of defiance or maybe a momentary lapse of sanity ... I stalk forward and slam the closet door so hard that I swear I hear something crack somewhere in the house. Or maybe it's me. Hell, it could be her. We've both become as wooden and hollow as the an empty shack. "I am not leaving."

She doesn't move.

She doesn't give me even a fraction of an inch to indicate that my stalwart outburst has phased her in the slightest.

"Erica -"

Her response is to yank back the cover and climb into the bed. She pointedly turns away from me and settles on her pillow. I can see the tension in her shoulder and I can tell by the curve of her jaw that she's gritting her teeth to keep from saying more and really, call me a coward, but this is one time that I'm not going to throw a rock at the caged tiger. I'm not that damn stupid.

As quietly as I possibly can, I gather the papers that were faxed to us by an unknown private investigator and I make a mental note to thank my father for nothing as sarcastically as I possibly can. I don't bother neatly stacking the story of who Erica's father is and instead I leave it lying haphazardly on the dresser. When I'm finished, I turn back to face her and like a concrete slab, she hasn't moved at all.

I have a choice to make.

I glance at the bedroom door and I know that I could walk across the hall and be alone with my thoughts in the guest room, but when you break it all down into what matters the most I'd rather go through a silent hell WITH her than without her. My hand is shaking a little when I flip off the light and turn the ceiling fan on. I pick my way across the floor in semi-darkness, going on instinct alone, and when I peel back the cover my hand is shaking. I hear her sigh and hold my breath as I brace for another outburst, but the only thing that happens is that the bed shifts and I know she's turned the other way.

A cold shoulder is better than no shoulder at all.

I'm usually a side sleeper and truly rest the best when she's got me cradled in her arms, but I stretch out on my back and gingerly pull the cover up over my chest. This is truly a discomfort the likes of which I have never endured in my life. My foot is itching and I'm terrified to scratch it. There's a wrinkle in the sheet under my arm and I don't want to tug at it. My pillow desperately needs to be plumped because my head has sunk into it far enough that it's marshmallowing up on either side of my face, threatening to suffocate me and I should have set the alarm on my phone and didn't.

Not that I'm in any danger of falling asleep.

This is possibly the worst fight we've had except for maybe the one that had me fleeing the cab and seeking refuge in Mark's apartment for the night. At least this time ... I'm still here.

I suddenly remember our conversation the day after that particular fight ... when she told me that she had purposely pushed me away because she wanted to be alone in her pain. She wanted to be alone on the anniversary of her parent's death and burial so she picked a fight about nothing.

And tonight she wants to be alone because she's finding out about a sister so it's a tragic, ugly birthday on the eve of her own.

I refuse to wake up on her birthday tomorrow with this tension between us.

I won't do it. I can't.

Turning toward her, I make a great show of plumping my pillow and tugging on the cover. She doesn't respond so I slide closer, until I'm spooning against her and she finally tenses just a little. I have to force my arm under hers and around her waist and since I get that far with no visible damage, I pull her back against me until there's nothing between us at all. Except, you know, the Grand Canyon. "I'm sorry," I whisper. "I should have talked to you about it before I did it. I shouldn't have kept it from you."

No answer.

But I'm not in the floor either so I'll count my blessings where I can.

I kiss her shoulder, then her neck. "You're not getting rid of me. You can push with both hands, Yellow, but I'm here. And I'm staying."

Maybe it's the promise.

Maybe it's the use of 'Yellow'.

Maybe it's the realization that spending most of your adult life as an orphan when you're really anything, but ...

I don't know exactly what causes it but she starts to cry.

I loosen my grip on her only long enough for her to turn toward me and wrap her arms around me. She holds on with everything in her as we tangle together and she doesn't say one word, she doesn't apologize for what she said and she doesn't have to. I know what the heat of the moment can roll off a person's tongue and I don't need to hear her apologize to know that she didn't mean it. She's telling me by letting me carry her through the storm and trusting that I will get her to the other side relatively unscathed.

I do my best to reassure her. I rub her back, her arm. I keep her hair off her sticky cheeks and drop kisses on her face every chance I get.

After a while it works.

Exhaustion, defeat, something merciful and just, drags out the final sheets of her pain and lets her sleep.

I take a deep breath when I feel hers even out.

That raft we built together has taken a beating tonight and we're still on it.

We haven't capriciously cast it aside and set ourselves adrift on opposite sides of the roaring sea, each of us holding an oar of accusation that we point in the other's direction.

Just look how far we've come.

And how far we've yet to go.


	35. Chapter 35

Tension headaches suck.

And when you wake up with one and the bright light from the window makes you feel mauled by a pitbull ... that sucks worse. I instinctively cover my eyes and contemplate covering my head and diving back into sleep when I realize that the bed is empty. Oh my god. Maybe she left me. I sit up fast and the cover falls to my waist at the same time that I realize Erica is sitting a few inches away from me. There's a tray on the bed between us and she doesn't say a word as she gingerly pushes it toward me. French Toast. And liberal amounts of cinnamon and powdered sugar, bacon, strawberries and coffee that smells good enough to have come from the seldom used press in the cabinet. There's also a wildflower in an ugly lime green vase and I don't know where in the hell she dredged that thing up, but she needs to dig a hole and bury it.

I want to smile at her. I want to find the perfect words to erase that horrible thing that happened the previous night, but my brain fumbles over clips and phrases that leave me feeling disjointed and unsure of anything. I hazard a glance at the closet door and it's slightly ajar, proving that I don't have the power to close it all the way and solidify my place on this side of it.

"Callie-"

"It's your birthday," I blurt out, more to save myself from hearing any possible utterance of goodbye from her lips than anything else. I can see that the fax from hell is still on the dresser and it's in the same haphazard disarray I left it in which tells me she hasn't touched it. "I should be cooking you breakfast in bed."

"Well," she drawls," the goal of breakfast in bed is to actually be able to eat it and you can't cook."

There are two forks on the plate and I pick one up, watching her do the same. She goes for a slice of strawberry while I cut a small corner off the toast. I don't eat it. I push it around in the syrup, causing the white powder to disappear into the sticky confection. She spears another slice of strawberry and holds it out to me. "These are so fresh you won't believe it. Try it."

I accept the fruit and chew it so slowly that it's like juice when I finally swallow it past the lump in my throat. Maybe she's bipolar. Hell, maybe I'm bipolar. Are we actually sitting here acting like everything is perfectly fine? Because it's not. I'm not. Here it comes. "Erica -"

"Please eat something, Cal."

"I'm not hungry."

"It's my birthday. Can you humor me?" She gives me a half smile. The fake kind. The kind that you give a patient who's giving you a hard time. "Please?"

She pokes her fork into the corner piece of toast that I cut off and holds it up. I take it and it's absolutely delicious just like I knew it would be, but when I swallow it ... I feel like there's a ball of lead in my belly. I watch her use a knife to cut a bite for herself and I want to tell her that I really like the way her hair looks. She's piled it in a messy twist and secured it with one of my clips. Her face is scrubbed clean and she took her earrings out which is good since I have a pair to give her for her birthday, but none of those things come out. What I say to her is, "I stayed."

Even though she just put a rather large chunk of toast into her mouth, she stops chewing. I watch her push the food to one side and hold it there. It's almost laughable. I once had a ferret that did the same damn thing. It makes her look like one of her teeth has abscessed on the right side. "Thank God you did," she finally says, meeting my eyes. "I didn't mean what I said."

"Which part?"

She swallows without chewing at all and I brace myself to do the Heimlich on her, but I don't have to. "Any of it," she replies. "All of it. Okay?"

"No ... it's really not okay. You wanted me to leave."

"Honey, I didn't -"

"I refuse to believe that you got so upset over my dad looking into yours. It's more than that. Isn't it?" I tilt my head a little when she doesn't look at me. "Is it me? Did I -"

"No, you didn't do anything, Callie. We're fine."

"Then tell me what the hell that was. Please? Because you scared me. You wanted me to leave." My voice breaks a little over that last word and I purse my lips to keep them from trembling. "You have to talk to me."

"I just - I guess I'm a little wired about meeting him tonight. I have been fortunate to be distracted with Jasper and surgery and you... but last night ... it all hit that it's really happening. This man that I don't know is coming here and as intrigued as I am to meet him ... I kinda wish I could kill him."

My eyes widen. "For not being there?"

"For being real." Her hand is shaking so much when she lifts the coffee cup that she sets it back down to avoid a scalding. I don't protest when she removes the tray and deposits it on the nightstand because clearly breakfast is a bust. When she comes back to the bed, she sits down a little closer than she was, facing me. Her blue eyes are piercing as she brushes my hair off my forehead and says, "You know how you told me that you've dreamed about the man that Jasper would be a million times?"

I nod at her.

"Well, I've done that same with my father. In my mind ... I've turned him into an astronaut, a lawyer, a famous movie star, a singer ... so many things that ... shattered ... last night. I wasn't prepared for that. I was prepared to meet him tonight and have him tell me who he really is, but I didn't want to see it in black and white. I didn't want to find out anything before he could tell me himself." She focuses on a curl over my shoulder, twisting it, dropping it and picking it up again to weave her fingers through it. She does that after sex, too. "I wasn't mad at you for finding out who he is, Callie, I'm mad at him for never finding out who I am. And you just happened to be available when I wanted someone to yell at."

"It was pretty impressive."

"I'm sorry, baby." She drops the curl again and cups my face, then trails her thumb over my swollen lip. "Any part of my life is your life and you can do anything with it that you want. And if you want to throw your money around like it's confetti then I'm along for the ride and I'm just happy to be there."

"I wasn't throwing money around, Erica. I really though that I was helping and quite frankly ... I'm tired of you mentioning my money at all."

"I'm sor-"

"Stop apologizing! You know ... if you want me ... then you have to accept all of me. That means that what's mine is yours. So if my money-"

"I don't care about your money! Look, I really appreciate what you did by trying to find out about him! I mean it! I know why you did it and I love you for it!" She reaches out, clasping my hand. Hers is incredibly cold. "Please? Make this a little easier on me. I'm close to begging and I don't beg so it could go either way if I actually have to do it. I could do it really well or be completely pissed at being reduced to it."

I have to force myself not to smile. It's very easy to make her beg when my face is buried between her legs and I'm teasing her relentlessly. I let my eyes search hers hopefully when I ask, "Do you believe me now? When I tell you that I'm not going anywhere?"

"I do." Her choice of wording sends an anticipatory shiver through me because one day ... she will be saying that for entirely different reasons. "Thank you for hanging onto me last night. You are the only person alive that I can handle seeing me break."

"You don't always to be the strong one."

"Well, that's a good thing because it's out of the question with you in the picture." She smiles again and I realize that I'm not the only one who's drowning in hopefulness. Once again I can see her heart dangling from her sleeve and it's swinging like a pendulum, just waiting for me to make it stand still. "Stop making this so hard on me, Lee. I'm almost officially over the hill and I can't take it. Will you please forgive me and give me a kiss?"

It's hard to hang onto anger that you really didn't entirely feel when someone asks you something like that. Especially when that someone has a soft, inviting mouth and really knows how to use it. I glance down at it in time to see her pink tongue dance out in anticipation, moistening her bottom lip. I know exactly how skilled she is with that and I lean forward, giving her a kiss that she deepens. She slides closer and I feel her hands on my shoulders, then against my throat as she tilts my head a little more to the left. This time it's my bottom lip that feels her tongue and I open my mouth, letting her seal her apology properly. My toes curl under the cover and when one of her hands drop to my breast I finally realize that I'm still very naked and I've been exposed from the waist up for our entire conversation.

How amazing is it that nudity is second nature with her? I don't feel vulnerable or bare ... even when we're in the middle of something tense. I think maybe it's because her love cloaks me all the time.

I smile against her mouth when she tweaks my nipple. "You didn't ask me to forgive you and let you molest me."

She leaves her hand on my breast, rubbing her thumb around my areola now. "I thought that was a standing invitation."

"It's your birthday."

"And I can't think of anything I want more."

"Well, you have actual presents."

"Can I start with this one?" Now her hand slides down over my waist and she starts to ease the cover back, but I grip it and pull it up over my chest, locking it with my arms. She whimpers. So help me GOD she actually WHIMPERS. "You're really not playing fair."

"You're right. Look under the bed." I point under me and she raises a brow. "Go on."

"You hid presents under the bed?"

"I figured you wouldn't think to look there."

"That's because your comic collection is under there."

"I didn't get you a comic book."

"Thank God."

I watch her slip off the bed and kneel down beside. I draw my knees up and wrap my arms around them as she gasps and looks up at me. She has quite a bounty of gifts from me and a few from my parents as well. I watch her pull out several of the packages and put them on the bed. I move them aside to make room for the rest and for her. Finally, the last of her impressive haul is stacked neatly next to me and she sits down staring at the assortment in shock. I have a sinking suspicion that this is the most anyone has ever given her for any holiday and that makes me incredibly sad. I pick up a little purple bag and say, "Do this one first."

"You bought way too much-"

"Do I have to remind you about all the stuff you bought me for mine?"

"Yeah, but -"

"Start with this and shut up," I tell her, but I'm smiling.

She pulls out tissue paper and picks up the velvet jewelry box, gasping when she opens it and sees the silver earrings inside. They're simple, a little plain, and exactly like a pair of mine that she borrows occasionally. I watch her trace them with her fingertips and then she smiles at me. "Is this your way of telling me to leave yours alone?"

"It's my way of saying we match. In all the right ways." I hand her another bag and watch her pull out a red sweater. It's designer and I can't wait to see her wear it because it's amazing when she holds it up in front of her. Red is definitely a good color for her. Naked may be the only thing better.

She makes quick work of a an autographed book by her favorite author, a new laptop because hers is pathetic, an engraved pen from my dad, a nice blue robe from my mother that I picked out, and a snowglobe of Italy that I found on our vacation when she wasn't looking. I think that will possibly be her favorite thing, but when she opens an oversized square package and sees the painting we were given the night I proposed, smoothed out and framed perfectly ... I know that I win at life. Her eyes fill with tears as she runs her hand over the gilded frame and I reach out to touch her cheek, catching one as it falls. "You like it? I wasn't sure if the frame was good enough."

"I was wondering where this was. It's so beautiful. It's perfect."

"It is." I hold up a box wrapped with rose paper. "I need a disclaimer on this one."

"I'm suddenly terrified. Tell me."

"Open it first." I watch her set the painting aside and hold my breath.

She tears the paper and stares down at her new camera. It's professional quality, very nice, very well reviewed. "Calllllllie," she draws out my name. "Why do I need a new camera when I have one in the office?"

The camera she is speaking of, the one in the office ... is also the one that Helen gave her. It's the one that had horrible videos of the two of them. "That camera died. Horribly. A complete loss. Not enough to bury."

"What did you do?"

"Before or after I ran over it?"

"You didn't!?"

"Uh huh."

"That was a perfectly good camera!"

"It was tainted. This is a better one. I promise." I smile sweetly. "And it also has video so if you're in the mood later -"

"You never cease to amaze me."

"Is that good or bad?"

She leans forward and kisses me again. "Very good. I'll never be bored with you."

I push a strand of her hair back and hold up the final package. She sets the camera down beside the bed and pulls the card from under the ribbon that I tied in place, reading it so slowly that my palms start to sweat. I spent hours fucking with a greeting card program I downloaded and the final result is something I'm proud as hell of.

_Dear Erica,_

_Who knew that we would finally get to this place? Definitely not me. I feel like I've fought a war to be in this spot and in this moment. I fought myself. I fought you. I fought my feelings and the best thing I've ever done is surrender. I want you. I want to mark every one of your birthdays by heart. That's where you are and where you have always been - in my heart. I believe in forever for the first time in my life and you gave that to me. You give me hope, you give me courage, and most of all ... you've given me a place to call home. This is where I want to spend the rest of my life and in your arms is where I want to spent the last of my days. I love you. You are, and will always be, my Yellow. You're the sunlight I look for in the darkest places and you are the place I will always feel the safest. Happy birthday. _

_Always,_

_Callie_

I watch another tear slip down her cheek as she finishes it and lean my head against her shoulder. "I love you, Yellow. Happy birthday."

"I don't deserve you."

"Well, you're stuck with me."

"I am so sorry about last night. I would never want you to leave, Callie. Never. This ... this wasn't a home until you. I love you so much."

She turns and hugs me, pulling me as close to her as she can. I feel her hands move over my bare back, her fingers in my hair, the front of her robe against my breasts. It takes every ounce of my willpower not to slam her onto her back and pull the belt of that robe open, but I somehow manage. After kissing her for a solid minute, I slide back a little and point at the box. "Open it."

She's still feeling the effects of my card and watching her is affecting me as well so I nudge her again. She tears into the blue paper and unveils a Victoria's Secret box. Her eyes meet mine and I grin devilishly. She breaks the tape that was holding the lid on and pulls apart the pink paper, revealing a lacy piece of fabric that she holds up in the morning light. "Uh, Callie, I don't actually wear -"

"I know," I reply, taking it from her. "This is actually for me and you get to unwrap it later."

She licks her lips. "Later? Why don't you put it on now?"

"No, I don't think so," I reply sadly, picking up the yellow panties and bra still in the box. "I think the perfect punishment for your little tirade last night ... is knowing that this will be under my dress tonight and check it out," I slip my fingers over the crotch of the panties. "They lace up."

"Jesus. What I did last night does NOT deserve the death penalty and waiting for this will KILL me."

"I'm not caving," I tell her. "Payback is a bitch."

"Oh, really?"

"Really. You're going to learn that -"

It happens so fast that I gasp.

I'm pinned on the bed and she somehow has the cover down around my thighs. I feel her hand between us, working on the belt of her robe and then the delicious warmth of her bare flesh is pressed intimately against mine. I attempt to free my legs, but she shakes her head and keeps them trapped under the cover with her own. She does let me push her robe down her arms though and I toss it over my head before palming her breasts. "Evil," I tell her. "Dirty fighter."

"I'm very dirty. Want me to show you just how much?"

"I think I have an idea, but I don't play well with cheaters."

"You could say no."

"I don't know that word."

She grins and leans down, kissing me hungrily. She tastes like strawberries and syrup and I could lose myself in her for -

The alarm chimes loudly, alerting us to the fact that the gate has been opened. "FUCK!" Erica cries. "YOU DID THAT WITH YOUR HORRIBLE TELEKINESIS! I KNOW IT!"

"You're onto me," I tell her, groaning. "It's probably my parents. I swear to God ... my mother KNOWS when there is an impending orgasm anywhere in my vicinity."

Erica gets to her feet and rifles through her gifts, putting on the blue robe for my mother's sake. It looks amazing on her and I take just a second to picture it opened and her blue panties exposed underneath it. She shatters my mental image by tossing me the robe she took off and it's still warm when I pull it on. We pad down the stairs and into the living room in time to hear a car crunch to a stop in front of the house. I open the door and watch Addison fumble with an oversized package, a purse that should be a suitcase, and a bouquet of flowers. Taking pity on her, I head onto the porch and relieve her of the flowers. "Good morning," I say. "Very early morning."

Addison looks at my robe then at Erica, who is standing in the doorway. "Oh god! I've interrupted sex, right?"

"It's okay," Erica assures her and I'm the only one who knows what the creeping red flush on her chest is really all about.

"Happy birthday," Addy says, climbing the porch steps and hugging her. She hands her the box and says, "This is from me and the flowers are ... I don't know. I intercepted the delivery guy trying to figure out how to buzz in."

I pluck the card out of the flowers and hold it out to Erica, who raises her brows. "They're from 'Joel, Hope, and the kids'."

It takes a lot to impress me, but that does. My brother may be growing a heart after all. In the living room, Erica sits down on the sofa and opens the box from Addison. It's a nice briefcase and I can tell that it's high quality just like everything else in Addison's life. When they hug again, I hear a whimper and tilt my head to one side. "What was that?"

"That," Addison snaps, stepping away from Erica, "is reason number eight thousand and twelve that I want to kill Mark Sloan."

"Oh god. What now?" I ask. "Everything looked fine when you left Joe's."

"That's because the man is a smooth talker," Addison tells me. "The convincing bastard waltzed over to my table and told me that his heart couldn't take it anymore. He said that he was so in love with me he couldn't stand it and that he would do whatever it took to have a life and a family with me. And then he said he was dying without me."

I gasp. "He said all that!? Holy shit!"

"He was pretty drunk," Erica deadpans. "I could tell."

"I know, right!?" Addison stalks across the room and unzips her large purse. "His hungover ass went out this morning and bought me this."

Two reddish blond paws appear at the mouth of the purse and that's when I realize that it's a dog carrier and not a handbag at all. When the puppy's head appears, I'm a goner. There is nothing in the world that is cuter than a fat puppy with big, curious eyes. "Awwwww!"

I flock down on the Golden Retriever and scoop it up, then grimace when I realize that it has a diaper on. Erica makes a disgusted noise behind me, saying, "What the fuck!?"

"It's my training!" Addison growls, throwing her hands in the air. "Mark actually had the AUDACITY to tell me that this would help me not be nervous about being a mother! Like ... I don't know what I'm doing! I deliver babies! Babies and dogs are NOT the same thing!"

"But it's such a sweet gesture," I say, rubbing my nose against the puppy's sweet smelling head. My opinion is met with scorn from both of them and their unanimous groans make me scowl. "Addison, it is! He's trying to get you prepared and, well, when you think about it ... by the time the baby gets here ... the puppy will be seven in dog years and you -"

"OH MY GOD!" Addison cries. "He said the same thing. Did you two plan this!?"

"No!" I shake my head vehemently. "We didn't."

"This is not a sweet gesture," Erica says. "It's insulting is what it is."

"Thank you." Pointing at Erica, Addison looks at me and adds, "SHE gets it."

"I get that he's a son of a bitch," Erica assures her. "Loud and clear."

Maybe I'm still edgy from last night. Or maybe I'm over Mark having a target on his back. I'm not sure what propels me to say exactly what I'm thinking, but I do. Oh, how I do. "You know what? I'm sick of you guys ganging up on Mark. He's trying ... which is more than I can say for either one of you. Erica, he's been fairly nice to you even though you haven't gone out of your way to give him a lot of reasons to be. Addison, did it occur to you that maybe he wanted to buy you a puppy so that he could learn a thing or two? It's not always about you! Maybe he needs help not being nervous. And we are talking about the guy who is trying to stay with you when you don't even know if he's the father of your baby."

I shove the puppy into Addison's arms and glare back and forth between my fiancé and best friend. "So why don't you give him the benefit of the doubt once in a while? Find someone new to pick on because Switzerland is starting to stockpile nukes and is not very happy."

The puppy latches onto the end of Addison's hair and playfully tugs. She looks down at it, absently scratching its ear, and then glances back up at me. "Note to self: call ahead next time and make sure you're not interrupting sex."

I run a hand through my own hair and slowly exhale. "Sorry. I just - this is killing him, you know? I can tell."

"Sorta like you killed him? For months?" Addison shifts the puppy, her eyes never leaving mine. "You're not exactly in a position to judge me, Callie. I get that you want to see him happy ... but you expect me to do it because you wouldn't."

"Okay, you know what -" Erica begins.

I cut across her. "Don't you dare make this about me, Addison, because -"

"STOP!" Erica says, loudly now.

The house phone trills to life and it's so rare to hear it that it takes me a second to realize where the sound is coming from. I go into the kitchen and answer it, cutting off the 'Jingle Bells' ring tone. I don't even want to know. "Hello?"

"Erica?"

"Sorry, hang on one second." I peer around the doorway, narrowing my eyes when I see that Addison and Erica are in deep conversation. Those two together ... bad news. "Erica, phone."

She walks toward me with a determined look on her face. She takes the cordless, but doesn't bring it to her ear. Instead, she glares at me. "Her hormones are all over the place. Take it easy on her."

When I go back into the living room, Addison is sitting on the loveseat with the puppy beside her. She looks a little green around the gills and I feel a lot of my anger dissipate more rapidly than it built. The dog is chewing on a rope toy and I kneel down, tugging on one end until a game of tug-o-war begins. I smile when a deep growl emanates from the dog and laugh out loud when it lets the toy go and leaps at me, licking my face. "Is it a girl or a boy?"

"Girl," Addison replies. "Mark said that he read that girl dogs are better with kids."

"What are you naming her?"

"I don't even want to keep her!"

With a sigh, I look up at Addison and say, "She'll need a house with a big fenced yard and, you know, a barbecue pit."

"Because she can cook?"

"No. Because having the dog and the barbecue pit means that you only need two point five kids and a husband to have that life you always wanted." Reaching out, I put my hand on hers. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to come down so hard on you where Mark's concerned and I don't expect you to make him happy because I wouldn't. I hope you'll make him happy because I couldn't. I could never have been you."

Addison starts to reply, but something stops her. I watch a crease appear between her brows as she says, "Erica? You okay?"

I turn around, still kneeling. I know precisely what's wrong with Erica when I see her face. "He's not coming ... is he?"

Erica shakes her head. Her lips purse, her jaw tightens and then she shrugs like it doesn't matter, but I know better. "It's the weather. They canceled his flight. He said that he will try to come tomorrow. Or later on."

"Well, that's good." Addison's voice is overly optimistic. "He's in Nebraska, right? I did see that there was some flooding and high winds on the news."

Saying nothing, Erica pads across the room and goes upstairs. I grimace and run a hand over my face. "I've never met her father, but I hate him already."

"You have to hate your in-laws. There are rules." Addison gathers the puppy and puts her back in her carrier. "I'm going to head out. Mark bought the dog, the diapers, and the carrier, but it never dawned on him that food would be a good idea."

"Good luck with her."

"What should I name her?" Addison asks, hefting the carrier over her shoulder. "I'm not good at this kind of thing."

I pull back the cloth screen and peer in at the puppy. It clumsily presses its nose against the mesh. "I think she looks like a 'Hope'. That's a good name. Because sometimes that's all a person has ... and that's all there is to cling to."

She gives me the crooked smile she is renowned for and then hugs me. "I'm sorry I'm a bitch."

"It's okay. I'm fluent in bitch, too."

"Best friends?"

"Always."

When we break apart, Addy glances at the stairs. "Take care of her."

"I will."

"I've heard that sex cures what ails you."

I grin at her. "Only if it's UNINTERRUPTED."

"Point taken. Carry on."

I've seen Erica Hahn pissed a few times. There are certain outward signs that I can detect and I usually stop whatever I'm doing and move away slowly. She squares her shoulders a little more than usual when she's about to blow her top. Her nostrils flare, her chin lifts defiantly, and that damnable dimple appears in her chin. When I find her sitting on the bench at the foot of our bed with her legs crossed and her arms folded almost primly over her knee, I draw up short. Her body posture says that she's calm, cool, and collected, but when I see her face ... I know better. It's like someone has draped yellow caution tape around her and I definitely proceed with caution. Her face is red and I have never pissed her off enough to be red faced before. I only make her red faced with just how kinky I can get in bed.

"Uh, Erica?"

"I knew he wouldn't show up."

"I don't think it's fair to hold it against him. The weather is bad. Those storms -"

"I don't care."

"I think you do."

She turns her head and levels me with a look that makes me back up until my backside hits the dresser. I don't know how much time passes, but I brace myself for whatever she's going to say. It can't be good. "I'm actually relieved."

"Relieved?"

"Truthfully, Cal, I didn't really want my father meeting your family at dinner."

"Wha - why didn't you say so?"

"Because you worked hard getting everything arranged and -"

"How do you know that?"

"Because your mother told me."

"Damn it."

Erica grins. "And I appreciate it, but really ... I don't know this man and your mother already makes me feel uncomfortable so I didn't want this whole ... thing ... playing out in front of her."

Well, fuck. That never dawned on me. I sit down beside her and take her hand, my fingers locking with hers. "You know what? I don't want ANYTHING playing out in front of my mother so let's go have lunch with them and then we'll have dinner by ourselves. Just like you wanted."

Her face brightens instantly. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." I lean into her, giving her a kiss.

While she's in the bathroom getting ready a while later, I call the Archfield and make a few last minute changes. The manager there takes it in stride and assures me that everything will be ready when we arrive that night.

I have to hand it to myself.

Sometimes I'm so impressive that it's scary.

My mother does not take our change of plans very well. I tell her over the phone and ask her to lunch which earns me a ten minute lecture on the lack of etiquette I possess. I leave the phone on the bed, on speaker, while she rants and I dig through my closet for something to wear. By the time she wraps up her speech, I'm dressed and ready to go. We agree to meet at a restaurant in an hour and Erica gives me a sympathetic hug. "On the bright side," she says, "at least your mother will be so distracted by your swollen lip that she will forget all about you cancelling dinner."

Erica Hahn could be a fortune teller.

The first thing my mother does when we walk into Joe's Crab Shack is hug Erica and present her with a bouquet of wildflowers. She spots me over Erica's shoulder and her eyes widen, her mouth drops open, and she stamps her foot in a rage. "What happened to your mouth!?"

"Erica beat me," I reply, keeping my face as stoic as I can. "She was just so mad about turning a year older that she couldn't keep it in."

Dad tilts my chin, then touches my lip. "Now tell the truth."

"Erica head butted me when we drove through the hedges because we were trying to have sex in the car," I say.

The wildflowers fall from Erica's hand and she bends down to get them fast. When she stands up, her face is the darkest shade of burgundy I've ever seen. I convinced her to wear her hair up and her ears are glowing, making her new earrings dull in comparison to how shiny she is all of the sudden. "I hate you," she tells me in a low, deep voice.

Grinning, I loop my arm through hers and kiss her cheek. She's flaming hot and I laugh at her. "Sure you do."

"Honestly," Mom growls. "I want to believe that was a lie, but looking at her face tells me otherwise. Apparently your father and I need to discuss the finer art of 'parking' with you, Calliope, because the first rule of thumb is to put the car in park before you straddle the gear shifter. Your father and I nearly drove into-"

"OH! EW!" I let Erica go and clap my hand over my own ears which are probably more neon than hers. "I never, ever want to know that you did that!"

My dad chuckles and moves in front of me, giving Erica a kiss on her cherry red forehead. "Happy birthday, Mija."

When he steps back ... I smile at him.

She's his daughter now, too.

And I love that.

I also love the fact that the entire wait staff comes over to sing a rousing rendition of 'Happy Birthday' to Erica because she just LOVES that.

Lunch, I decide, is a success.

My mother didn't mention our change of plans once, but she did mention the wedding in a way that makes me think I'm not the only one looking forward to it.

"Are you sure this is okay to wear?"

"Erica, you are not the type of person to worry so much about clothes."

She turns in front of the mirror, studying her backside. The black slacks are cut to be tight, making her look curved and fine in all the right places. The red sweater I bought her looks as wonderful as I knew it would and her hair, which is down and insanely curly, contrasts against it beautifully. It's gotten long, so long. It's well past her bra in the back when it's straight, but now that it's curling it rests just below her shoulders. I can't wait to tangle my fist in that hair later and guide her head exactly where I've wanted it all day. I impatiently watch her slip on a pair of heels and cross my legs because the throbbing between them doesn't seem to be going away any time soon.

She walks back into the closet and when she emerges, she's carrying a long black coat. I pick up my own, which is just as long, but leather, and fold it over my arm. "Ready?"

Erica smiles at me, cocking her head just a little as her eyes move over my pants and sweater the same way my own slid over her. "Are you wearing it?"

Grinning devilishly, I lift the front of my shirt and let her see the yellow bra underneath. Her smile fades and she takes a step forward with a look of clear intention on her face. I yank my shirt back down, even though it causes me physical pain to do so, and shake my head. "We have reservations, Erica."

"Being late is fashionable."

"No."

"I thought you didn't know that word."

"I'll go without you. I mean it." I lift my purse and sling it over my shoulder. "Are you in?"

"Not yet, but I will be soon."

My legs feel like jelly, but I somehow manage to make it down the hall and into the car. We talk about Jasper on the drive and how happy he was to see us when we visited him earlier. Dad had taken him to the hospital gift shop and told him to pick out anything he wanted to give Erica for her birthday. Jasper chose a card with a horse on it, a stuffed bear, and a coffee cup filled with candy that says 'I love you'. Erica was so moved that I swear she almost cried and Jasper was so excited to give it to her that he did. His big brown eyes welled with tears when he said, "Happy birthday, Yellow. I love you".

At the Archfield, Erica asks if we should leave our coats in the car and I vehemently shake my head. I grab both of them and we head upstairs to the restaurant; the same one that she used the cover of the table to do unspeakably wonderful things to me in. When we arrive, the manager is standing near the doorway and he bows dramatically, making me feel like the Queen of England. It's overdone and I have to roll my eyes, but Erica smacks me on the back of the head when he turns and mouths that I better 'be nice'. For all intents and purposes, it look likes he will be leading us to our table in the corner, but he bypasses it in favor of the roof instead.

It's definitely cold and the air is crisp as we walk across the rooftop. My hair whips out around me and my coat lifts up behind me like bat wings when I put it on. I start to make a joke about it, but stop when I see our table. There are three oversized outdoor fireplaces that are smoking beautifully and our table is in the middle. It's gorgeous. It's exactly what I wanted. As soon as we're seated, Japanese screens like the ones that were used on the roof in Italy are placed just behind the fireplaces, keeping the heat inside and giving us plenty of privacy. The screens knock the wind off as well and I'm not cold at all when I order a bottle of wine and ask for Erica's favorite bread to get us started.

When the waiter walks away, I notice that Erica hasn't touched her menu. I raise a brow, "What? Are you too cold?"

"Are you trying to recreate Italy?"

"Why? Is it working?"

She nods. "I love you."

"I love you, too." I reach across the table and squeeze her hand. "More than you'll ever know."

"I do know."

We go through a basket of bread as we wait for the main course and we spend our time talking about Italy and agree that, hands down, that's where we're going on our honeymoon. It's a given. We'll go back to see Ange and Claude and let them share a little of our happiness because they were deprived of their own. When our steaks arrive, the topic of conversation changes to Mark and Addison. To my surprise, Erica genuinely wants the baby to be Mark's and we formulate a plan to get our friends together once and for all.

When dessert arrives, Erica smiles at the heart shaped red velvet cake and demands that I eat it with her. I happily oblige and say, "You know, there was only one thing missing that night in Italy."

"I can't think of a single thing I would have changed."

I clear my throat, a little loudly, and music starts to play. Getting to my feet, I hold out a hand and say, "Dance with me?"

She lets me pull her up. "I don't dance well."

"Then I'll lead." I step into her arms and rest my head on her shoulder as we sway back and forth to the strings being played behind the screens. Two violinists and two guitar players work their way through a nice, simple ballad as we move back and forth. She only steps on my toe once, but she feels good enough against me that any threat of pain is chased away. She also kisses me, her hands on my hips and my own tangled in her hair. I don't know what in the world I was thinking when I decided to make tonight a family affair. This should have only EVER been our time. The song ends and I cup her face, kissing her again. "Have you ever seen the city from up here, Yellow?"

"Just the night we ate here."

I slip my coat back on and hold hers out, but when she goes to put her arms in, I shake my head. I put it on her backwards, so that it completely covers her front. I have plans. I hear the musicians retreat and take her hand, leading her to the furthest point. She grips the rail, leaning over to look down and I move behind her, sweeping her hair over her shoulder. I latch onto the back of her neck, sucking just enough to leave a trace of me there, and say, "Breathtaking, huh?"

"The view or you?"

I smile and slide my hands around her waist. She stops breathing. So help me GOD she actually does stop breathing when I move to the button on her pants and flip it open. The zipper eases down next and I say, "You haven't seen anything yet."

"Callie -"

"Shhh." I move my palm over her belly before I lower it into her panties. With my free hand, I urge her to lift one leg and brace her foot on the lower rail. She complies and she's fully open to me now. I rub across her smooth, silky mound, massaging, kneading. She makes a sound in the back of her throat and I say, "I love the way you feel. I love the way you swell," I drag my fingers over her distended nub, pulling a moan from her, "when you know what's coming."

I dip one finger into her, pulling her wetness back up to her clit, then tug at her ear with my teeth. "Erica." My voice is huskier than it has ever been and she let's out an 'ahhh' in response. "I love the way you sound. I love those little noises that you try to keep in, but can't. I know how to make you scream."

I slide two fingers into her and her head falls back on my shoulder, exposing her throat. I press open mouthed kisses all along it as her hips begin to undulate in time with my fingers. I feel her shift a little, opening her legs more and with my free hand, I slide her pants down just a little further ... enough to make room for both of my hands. The things I do to her, the ways I touch her, the naughty, filthy things I whisper in her ear ... it's enough to make me come, but she doesn't. Something tells me she's stopping herself, she doesn't want it to end.

My own hips begin to move in time with hers and she reaches back, grasping at my thigh. I can feel her fingernails raking across my pants and when she grips my leg it's almost painful, almost pinching, almost too much to take. I watch the city sparkle beneath us like a million twinkling diamonds and say, "I could fuck you every hour and it wouldn't be enough."

"Oh ... godddd!" Her other arm snakes up around my neck and she turns her head, pulling me into a kiss. Our tongues duel as I put a little more pressure on her and then ... then she lets go. The force of her orgasm almost knocks us both down because she kicks out with the foot still on the rail and almost sends us toppling backwards. I hang onto her and she grips the rail again, jerking, twitching, breathing so hard that I can see it in front of us. She kisses me again and it's my turn to groan.

I don't think I've ever been so turned on in my life.

She pulls my hands from her pants and turns around, clinging to me as her mouth descends on mine again. It's a crushing, brutal gnashing of tongues, teeth, and primal need. I can feel her hardened nipples through her sweater and her coat and I'm sure that she can feel mine as well because her thumb finds it and thumps against it hard enough for me to feel it to my toes. I also feel my own wetness as acutely as I felt hers. When she fumbles with the button of my pants, I don't hesitate to help her. I shove them open and grip her hand, putting it exactly where I want it.

I think it's possibly the quickest orgasm to ever hit anyone.

Her breath against my neck, my name on her lips, and her fingers touching me just ... like ... that ... and I'm done. I come furiously, my entire lower half seizing under her ministrations. We stand that way for a while, her hand soaking up my desire and our mouths fused together. I finally feel her shiver and realize that I'm freezing, too. She looks as disappointed as I feel when I tug her hand from my pants and button them once more. She slips her coat off and I help her put it on the correct way before we walk back to our table. I pick up the bill and we head inside to pay because neither of us want to stand in the cold longer than we have to.

While we wait for our car to be brought around, she puts her head on my shoulder and says, "I'm going to do things to you when we get home that you will not believe."

"Is that so?"

She nods.

And the drive only takes thirty minutes, but it might as well be thirty hours. I want her that much. I need her ... that much.

We're undressing before we're out of the garage and my coat lands close enough to Feo that the poor cat pounces on it and proceeds to try to shred it. We ignore our pet as Erica's sweater lands on the lamp and my shirt hits the recliner and falls in the floor, where Ruma lazily curls up on it. Erica climbs the stairs backward, unwilling to take her hands off me long enough to consider safety and by the time we make it to the hallway, my pants are stuck on my shoe and I have no idea where my other shoe is. She strips out of her own slacks and leaves them where they fall and when she goes into our bedroom, she draws up short and I walk into her back.

There are candles everywhere. "Thank you, Addison," I murmur.

Erica grins and tugs her bra off as I discard the rest of my clothing and pick up the lacy yellow coverlet that goes with my panties and bra set. I slip it on and lift the lighter that is resting on the bed. "I was going to tell you a reason that I love you for every year of your life, Erica, but you are old and really ... I don't think I can wait that long."

She throws a pillow at me.

I dodge it and begin lighting the candles. "I'll do the top ten instead."

Smiling, she reclines on the bed to watch me and I can feel her eyes moving over me in appreciation as more and more light fills the room. "I love the way you look in the bed."

"Do you, Cal?"

"Especially when I'm under you."

"Never would have pegged you for a bottom."

I chuckle, moving to a larger candle. "I love the way you say my name when you're sleeping and the way you reach for me first thing in the morning."

"I have to make sure you're not a dream."

"I love the way you smell like lilacs ... even though for a moment ... I buried a lilac bush and tried to convince myself I hated it."

"Sucker."

"I love the way you can make name calling seem endearing."

That gets a laugh from her.

I light a small tea candle. "I love the way you feel when you hug me after a hard day ... it's like coming home ... no matter where we are."

"That's mutual."

Moving to the other side of the room, I set to work on a few more. "I love that you let me be myself with you. Food choices notwithstanding."

"We do need to work on that."

"I love the way you love Jasper." I meet her eyes, winking at her. "Even if he does have a crush on you."

"I may have a crush on him."

"I love the way you trust that I won't kill you when you say shit like that because I so would."

Another laugh.

I set the lighter aside and slowly move back around the room. "Just two more reasons. Two out of a million."

She sits up. "I'm all ears."

"I love the way you love me." My throat tightens a little and I look down at the floor, reigning in my emotions. "I've never had this before and I wouldn't want to have it with anyone else. I'm glad that you're my first and that I'm your last. You make me feel safe and completely at ease and I never, ever doubt the way you feel for me because you show it in everything you do."

"Aw, Lee, I -"

"One more," I interject, cutting her off. "I love the way you let me love you. The real you. Not Dr. Erica Hahn, the badass heart surgeon with a chip on her shoulder. You let me see you, touch you, feel you ... believe in you. You are badass, but you're also the most tender and loving person I have ever know. And loving you is the greatest thing I've ever experienced in my life. You let me in, you don't close any doors, and that makes me think that you trust me as much as I trust you."

"I trust you with my life." Her voice is thick with emotion when she stands up. I don't move as she walks toward me ... instead I gaze at her, bathed in the soft glow of the candles, and I know that there is nowhere in the world I'd rather be. When she's in front of me, I lift my eyes to hers, noting that they're a little shinier than usual. "I kind of thought that thing you did to me on the roof was the best gift ever, but I was wrong, Callie."

"Oh?"

She unties the lacy belt of my coverlet and pushes it over my shoulders. "This? It's definitely the best gift ever."

"You should probably play with it ... just to make sure."

Her palms cup my breasts and her thumb moves over my darkened nipple, which is visible through the lace. Wordlessly, she leans down and traces it with her tongue, causing me to moan her name in supplication. I unfasten my bra when she takes her time, but she holds it in place long enough to repeat the process on the other nipple and by then I'm in such a frenzy that I'm ready to jump her. When she kneels down in front of me, pulling the bra down my arms as she goes, I chew on my bottom lip ... anticipation killing me.

The yellow thong I'm wearing is the most uncomfortable thing I've ever experienced and I want nothing more than to be rid of it, but she has other things in mind. She turns me around and rubs the globes of my ass before she kisses one, then the other. When I feel her teeth, I yelp in shock and try to turn back toward her but she holds me firm. I feel her tongue next, trailing lazily over my skin and I whimper now, threatening her.

She takes her sweet time.

Her fingertips trail over the front of my legs and down to my feet, where she rakes her nails over the tops of them until my toes are dug so deeply into the carpet that I may never be able to free them. I can feel her breath on the back of my thigh and whisper, "Please?"

"Oh, you do know the magic word. Turn around."

I comply and stand perfectly still as she traces the silk ribbon that laces the front of the panties together. I want her to ignore that fucking ribbon and yank them down, but she doesn't. She moves in for the kill and I anticipate feeling her kissing me through the lace, but when she pulls away, one end of the ribbon is between her teeth.

And so help me GOD ... she keeps her hands on my ass as she works her tongue under the laces, loosening and tugging, until I'm shaking all over. It's the most intimate and insanely hot thing I've experienced and I watch her through hooded eyes as she exposes me a fraction of an inch at a time.

Whoever designed these panties should be shot because the lacing stops just above my clit ... which really ... that's all I care about at the moment. Erica senses my distress because she looks up at me, brow furrowed. "Hmm, I don't know, Callie. I think this toy may be broken. I can't get to the spot that -"

I hook my thumbs in the waist and shove them down. "Try it now."

She shamelessly laughs at me, getting to her feet and pulling me against her. I really don't want sweet, delicate kisses or her slow caresses against my back so when I push her toward the bed, she gets the picture. We fall in a tangle of limbs and lust, arching and urging, twisting and turning. I finally find myself flat on my back with her hovering over me. The candles cause shadows to dance over her face and I reach up, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "You're beautiful," I tell her. "I'm the luckiest person alive."

She shakes her head. "You have us confused. I am the lucky one. And you are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen in my life."

"I have a really pretty orgasm face. Wanna see it?"

Nodding, she kisses a path down my body. The valley between my breasts, the curve of my waist, my ribcage and finally ... oh god ... finally ... she slides her tongue over me and I dangle on the precipice for her. This is what love is, standing on the edge of eternity and looking down at the bottomless, endless wishing well that you fill with your hopes and dreams ... knowing that the person beside you hears them all. And can make everything your heart desires come true ... just by taking the journey with you.

I feel weightless as she devours me.

I feel complete, whole.

And when her fingers slip into me I've never been more filled in my life. She's in me ... she's in all of me: mind, body, soul.

I come with my hands in her hair and a while later ... she comes with her own hands clutching at the headboard as she sits astride my face.

There are moments in life where every aspect of it feels completely perfect.

This is one of those.

My cell phone rings at the butt crack of dawn. I open one eye and glare at the shard of light that would dare have the audacity to peek into our room. Erica shifts, moving her arm and leg a little tighter over me. "Let it ring," she suggests. "Fuck it."

I'm tempted to do just that until I see the number.

I scramble to answer it. "Daddy?"

"Did I wake you?"

"Yes! Is Jasper -"

"He's fine, baby."

"What's wrong?"

"I need to let him tell you."

I hold my breath and I can hear my mother in the background, saying something to someone ... and I don't know what's happening. Erica shifts and sits up, a worried expression on her questioning face. I start to tell her that everything's okay, but Jasper breathes into the phone. "Cal-lee?"

Oh my god! My whole name! HE SAID MY WHOLE NAME!

"Hey, buddy. What's wrong?"

"Guess what?" he says.

OH MY GOD. OH MY GOD.

"Tell me," I urge.

"I tied my shoe! Real tie up shoes! New ones from Mama."

"You did?"

"Come and see! I did it!"

"I'll be there in just a few minutes," I tell him, trying not to sob in the phone. "Good job, buddy."

"You are my buddy."

I do cry now and Erica wraps her arm around me. "Put Daddy on the phone, Jazz."

"Okay."

"Callie?" Dad asks.

"Did he really tie his shoe?" It's unfathomable for me. Jasper could barely tie his shoe at ten years old. He was just too damn lazy to be bothered with it.

"Mija, he tied the prettiest bow you've ever seen." Dad's crying. I can hear it in his voice. "And he colored in the coloring book Addison gave him ... between the lines. Between the lines, baby."

"Oh my god."

"He was up and down all night ... doing new things, trying new things. Dr. Yang said that he counted the floors on the elevator off to her and was correct every time."

In the background, my mother says, "It's a miracle."

"I'm on my way," I tell him. "I'll be there soon."

"Don't rush, Mija. He's not going anywhere. I think our Jazz may be coming home to us."

I hang up the phone and sit there in shock.

"He tied his shoe?" Erica asks, prodding me lightly with her elbow when I don't respond. "Callie?"

"Oh, Erica, it's so much more than that!"

"Let's go."

We're dressed and on the road in fifteen minutes.

No one says a single word to us when we race through the lobby. Mark is in the elevator and I bump into him, causing him to spill coffee over his hand. "Your brother took my latte while ago. And since he didn't call me 'ass' ... I figured I'd get another one for him."

Erica grins at him. "You are human, Sloan. Who knew?"

"Zip it, troll." He winks at her, smiling playfully. "How was your birthday?"

"Excellent," Erica replies. "We had a great time."

"I, uh, bought you a briefcase, but Addison stole my fucking idea. Did you find my gift in her briefcase, which she thinks was so much better than mine?"

Erica's eyes widen in shock. "No. Will it bite me?"

He grins. "No, it won't. Unfortunately. Check it out, though, okay?"

"Suddenly ... I'm terrified," Erica says.

I'm bouncing on the balls of my feet in anticipation and shoot out the doors the second they open. I brush past Cristina, past Lexie and George, and charge into Jasper's room. He's sitting on the windowsill, staring out at the city. He looks comical in his boxer shorts, tied up Nikes with no socks, and tank top. He waves enthusiastically and points out the window. "Look, Cal-lee, a helicopter!"

I go to the window and stare up at the copter that is leaving Seattle Grace's helipad. "Do you like that?"

"I love that," Jazz tells me, his voice full of rapture. "I want to ride it. I want to fly."

"You already are," I whisper.

"I am?" he asks.

I pull the lace on his shoe and untie it. "Show me, Jazzy."

He gives me the most magnificent smile I've ever seen. "I am tired of this."

But he still ties his shoe. It's slow, it's a little bit clumsy, but when he's finished ... it's perfect. I lean my head on his shoulder and he hugs me, pulling me a little closer. We stay that way until he sees Erica and then he hops off the sill and barrels toward her. He tugs her to the window, but the helicopter is long gone. I don't know what he's bringing her over for.

He takes my hand, then hers and puts them together. "Now then," he says, watching us intertwine our fingers. "I am sleepy."

Mom helps him into the bed, but he won't let her take off his new shoes. I watch him curl up on his side and say, "One treatment. How is this possible after one treatment?"

"He had another one yesterday, pumpkin," Mom says, tucking the cover around him. "We didn't want to tell you and make you worry because it was Erica's birthday and you had plans. Derek was able to take the machine to an eight and leave it there for a while."

"It didn't hurt him?" I ask.

Dad rubs my shoulder, smiling at me. "It did hurt him, but Dr. Stevens came in and read him a book while it was going on and he calmed right down. They gave him pain meds about halfway through and he was fine."

I watch Jazz drift off to sleep.

Izzie Stevens took my husband from me.

But she's giving me back my brother.

I'd say that she's giving me something far grander than she took.

However, I'm too overcome to say anything at all.


	36. Chapter 36

Hello, Readers!

As you are looking at this ... I am hiding under my bed. I want to preface this by saying that I have never written anything like this in my entire life and I can't decide if I'm mortified or a nervous wreck. I think it might be both. So many of you have sent me private messages asking for this and here it is. Kinky sex. I'm going to remain under the bed for a few days I think. So be gentle. :)

After spending most of our off day with Jasper, Erica and I return home and flop down on the sofa. Our cats come running and spring onto the sofa, forcing us to give them our full attention. As I pick Feo up and look at him, I finally have to admit the truth. His name is perfect for him. He is ugly. He's not just a little ugly. He's full blown scare a little kid, freak out an old lady, and make you wrinkle your nose ugly. He won't need a costume for Halloween. That's for sure. When I point this out to Erica she acts scandalized and reaches over to cover Feo's ears. "Leave him alone. He can hear you."

"They are ugly, but they're our uglies."

She shoots me a sidelong glance. "Our uglies are more fun. Especially when we bump them."

"Such sexy talk in front of the children."

"If these were our kids ... I'd be very, very upset."

"They can hear you. Remember?"

"What do you want to do today?"

"This. Play with our cats and hang around the house being lazy."

"It's nice that you set your goals so high."

"What did you have in mind?"

"The same thing. Which proves that I have become just like you. You're bad for me."

"And you love it."

"Basically."

Ruma stares Erica down, lying on her chest with his nose only inches from hers until she relents and gives both cats a little milk in a saucer. They thank her by weaving through her feet until she nearly falls and the milk goes flying. Because I laugh at her she gives me the wedgy to end all wedgies.

Which ... leads to sex.

Naturally.

I need to train the cats to do that more often, I think.

She's flipping through the channels on the television later when I say, "Did you open your briefcase yet? I wonder what Mark got you."

Erica makes a face. "You don't think he'd put a snake in there, do you?"

"I told him about the snake in Nebraska. There is NO WAY he would do that."

"You told him about that!?"

"I was channeling the spirit of the Croc Hunter in that trailer and you know it. I had to say something."

Hitting me with the pillow, she gets up and retrieves the briefcase. Ruma and Feo jump on the sofa and try to investigate, but I hold them back. "No, let them go," she tells me. "Maybe he put a rat in here and these little fuckers can earn their keep by killing it for me."

I watch her flip the clasp and open the case. It's really nice on the inside. There are pockets everywhere and all sorts of little gadgets and gizmos to make her life a little more organized. She picks up a long black box that has a red ribbon around it and says, "I think it's champagne."

"Could be."

She slips the ribbon off and opens one end of the box, spilling the contents into her hand.

My mouth drops open when the bright yellow dildo vibrates to life. It purrs louder than both of our cats combined.

Beside me, Erica shakes her head, turns it off and says, "I gotta hand it to him ... the man has a sense of humor."

I take it from her and it's heavy, gel filled, and thick. A card has been rubber banded to it and I pull it off, handing it to her. I try to picture Mark Sloan in a sex shop, but I can't. I'm sure that he ordered this ... neon dick ... online. It even has veins. Alien penis, for the win.

"Oh wow," Erica gasps suddenly, resting a hand against her chest. "Oh ... wow."

"Oh ... what?" I lean my head against her, looking at the card. It's got a naked man on the cover holding up a sign that says 'You know you miss it', but that's not what has her attention. There are two tickets inside and she is staring at them in shock. "Box seats, Callie. I tried like hell to get any seat. Just one."

I take the tickets and look down at them. "'Der Fliegende Holländer'. What is that?"

"'The Flying Dutchmen'. It's a German opera that I've wanted to see for years," she replies. "I was scrolling through my phone one day trying to buy tickets and Mark asked me what I was doing. How in the hell did he manage this?"

"Mark manages a lot of things, Erica. He just doesn't get a lot of credit for it."

Sighing, Erica's shoulders slump and she picks up her phone, sending a quick text. "It's time to eat crow and invite Mark over for dinner. I asked him to bring Addison and their dog. We'll put our plan into action while they're here. Deal?"

"Deal." I lean forward and kiss her, smiling when her hand goes to my breast. "You trying to tell me something?"

"Yep."

"Okay, you do realize that you're insatiable, right? One hour. One hour, Erica, that's how long it's been since we got naked and sweaty."

"You did tell me on the roof of the Archfield that you could fuck me every hour and it wouldn't be enough." She licks her lips in a way that nearly chokes me. Lust flares up in me like an inferno and I start to throb in all the right places when she adds, "And I haven't had enough, baby."

She makes quick work of my shirt, pulling it over my head and dropping it in the floor. When she eases the strap of my bra down and latches onto my shoulder, sucking and nipping, I groan her name. Just like that, I'm completely under her spell and at her mercy and she can do anything she wants to me when ... the phone rings. "Damn it," I whisper. "Let the machine get it."

Erica nods and moves to the other side of my neck as she unfastens my bra. It slides off my arms at the same moment that a gravely male voice fills our house. "Erica? It's me ... your ... your father. I wanted to leave you a message and say -"

Leaping to her feet, Erica rushes into the kitchen and grabs the phone before her dad can finish. I hear her replying to him and I can tell from her tone that she's not happy about their conversation. He's not coming. I don't need her to tell me that and as pissed as she probably is ... I'm about forty times more pissed on her behalf. I lift my bra and start to refasten it because I'm sure that sex will be the last thing on her mind when she comes back. I'm fumbling with the clasp when she returns and she arches a brow. "You turning me down, Lee? I thought we were just getting started."

What the fuck? Surely she's upset. "I - no - I just thought -"

"Don't think." With a bright smile, Erica picks up the dildo and studies it, then looks at me. "We have a while. You ... wanna play?"

"With that?" I shake my head. "It's huge."

"I haven't forgotten your little sin box up there, Callie. What do you say?"

Unbidden, the fight we had about the fact that I enjoyed having her on top of me so much flits through my head. I recall every word she said about not being able to compete with the men in my past. I don't need anything else, but looking at her face I think maybe she does. "What did your dad -"

"I don't want to talk about him." She closes her fingers around the yellow dildo and my eyes widen when I see that they barely reach around it. I've had sex with happily endowed men before, but this would be like ... being a virgin again. She stares down at the phallic toy, lost in thought. There's a line on her forehead and her lips are a hard line.

Reaching out, I touch her arm. "I think you need to talk about this."

"I need you."

Before I know what's happening, Erica has a death grip on my wrist and she is practically dragging me towards the bedroom. She pushes me down on the bed and tells me to wait there while she fishes around in the back of her underwear drawer. I start to stand up, to peek and see what she's rummaging around for, but she barks at me to sit down. I do what I'm told. I never do what I'm told, but I've also never been yanked along behind someone either. There's something different in her right now, something I've never seen before. It doesn't scare me, but it definitely intrigues me.

Erica tosses a black garment that I catch just a glimpse of on top of the dresser and starts peeling off her pants, then her underwear. She picks up whatever it was that she fished out of the drawer and turns her back to me. The alien penis is nowhere to be seen at this point and I'm really starting to wonder what's going on. Erica bends at the waist and I realize that she's sliding on something that looks like panties, but it can't be. And when she turns towards me, and asks me to zip her up, I swallow loud enough for her to hear my throat from across the room.

The dildo that Mark Sloan so graciously gave to my fiancé is now protruding from a harness like I've never seen before. I look up at Erica and expect her to be laughing, but she's not. There's something so dark in her blue eyes that it takes my breath away. And I let my gaze move over her body, taking in the shocking contrast of the black harness against her pale skin as I zip the two sides together. It doesn't look ridiculous. Quite the contrary, it looks hot as hell and when her hand goes to the dildo and she readjusts it slightly, my mouth drops open and a moan escapes the back of my throat.

"Mmm hmm," she says, smiling now. "Knew you liked it."

"I did. Past tense," I mutter, honestly afraid of pissing her off while she's got a flagpole strapped to herself. Does she not remember how she told me she couldn't compete with the penises in my past? What am I supposed to do here? And the size of that thing... I'm not ready for it, but there's a look of utter longing on her face that tells me she is ready. Maybe she even needs it. I open my mouth to say something, anything, but she takes my hand and brings it to the dildo, guiding it up and down the length. "Erica, I don't need -"

"I told you before that I'm not intimidated by anything you bring into the bed."

"I think it's safe to say that you are bringing this." I look up at her, stilling our hands on the toy. "Do you ... like ... doing this?"

Erica points to a button on the side of the panties that I didn't notice. "When you're ready ... hit that button for me and there's a spot right here," she guides my hand between her legs where I feel something hard, "that vibrates and every time I thrust ... I like it. I like the hell out of it."

"Daaaamn."

"Come here."

I let her pull me to my feet and kiss me. It's frenzied, frantic. It puts me on edge and makes me more than a little nervous. What she's doing right now? This is her forgetting that her father isn't coming. I know that. I feel the dildo on my stomach, hard and insistent, and something about the newness of it, the dirtiness of it, makes me want to help her forget. This is a new side of her and I want to see what happens next. I want her to take me there. I want to give in and let her be in control and I -- don't even recognize myself at this point. But I know I'll surrender. I always do with her.

I actively avoid thinking about who else may have benefited from her vibrating harness of debauchery and go with it. If I can wear a straightjacket in the bed, I think it's safe to say that this is not going to intimidate me.

Quite the contrary ... it arouses me.

It's an idiosyncratic experience to see her this way. Even if the dildo was flesh colored and matched her skin tone it would still be odd. Her breasts contradict the phallic protrusion and the leather whispers and creaks when she moves. It's sensory overload and she seems to realize that I'm torn between staying and running when she smiles at me and says, "I'll be gentle."

She's mocking me. I narrow my eyes and say, "Don't restrain yourself for my benefit, Yellow. I assure you I can take it."

I find myself flat against the mattress a second later and she buries her face between my legs without preamble. I don't think I realized exactly how turned on I was. Or maybe I'm in a constant state of arousal where she's concerned because every brush of her tongue has me begging her for more and when she slides her fingers into me, I buck upward, crying out her name. She gets me almost there ... I'm so close that I can taste it myself ... and then stands up. "Wha-"

She slaps my hand when I move it between my leg to finish what she started so I push myself up on my elbows to watch her. A small bottle of warming massage oil is pulled from her nightstand drawer and it's sinfully erotic when she covers the dildo, her pale hand pumping it slightly. When she moves that hand between my legs, smoothing oil over me and into me ... I can barely breathe. The heat is instantaneous and she has finger fucked me with the oil before but there's something about the anticipation of what's coming that sets me on edge.

"Slide up the bed," she whispers.

Once again, I obey like the well mannered child I never was and she follows on her knees. I watch the alien penis bounce up and down as she comes toward me and my mouth goes dry. She pushes my legs apart just a little further and rubs the tip of the dildo along my slit. I watch as she repeats it, rubbing a little harder. I'm so wet and ready when she moves it inside me that I push upward, taking more of it than I was anticipating. It stings. Did I mention that it's a little on the large side? She backs up and smiles at me, leaving only the tip inside. "You still think you can take it?"

"Try me."

It's like being a virgin again. She slams her hips forward and there's burning, pulling, and I cry out in shock, pain, and ... because it feels really fucking good. Buried to the hilt, she falls down over me, kissing me ravenously. Her tongue strokes against mine and then begins to move in time with her hips, which are grinding against me in a circle. She's gently making me accommodate her ... it ... hell, I don't know. What I do know is that I love having both of her hands in mine as she laces our fingers and moves them over my head. I love the feel of her breasts flattened against mine and her stomach rubbing against me. I wrap my legs around her, pushing my heels against her ass to make her move.

She doesn't disappoint.

The pain is forgotten as she begins to thrust, gently at first and then more insistently as I moan. Her fingers stay entwined with mine as she picks up the pace and the sounds that she makes are unlike any I've heard before. She likes it. She likes topping me, dominating me, possessing me this way. I don't know if the harness feels good or if I feel good, but listening to it makes me even wetter and I'm close to coming without any further stimulation when I remember the button on the harness. I free my hand and fumble for it, finally finding it. I press it once and hear a dim humming for a split second before her cries of pleasure drown it out.

A moment later, her hand brushes mine out of the way and she moves back a little. I feel the dildo twist inside me and then it vibrates to life as she slams into me again. My eyes roll, my toes curl, I bite her shoulder because it's the closest thing to me and she tugs at my hair, pulling my mouth to hers. It's furious now as her pelvis slaps against mine and I tighten my legs around her, lifting myself up to meet her halfway. I come first and she really should have kept holding my hands down because I rake my nails over her back without meaning to. I guess she likes it, though, because she yells in pain, in pleasure, in ... passion ... and I feel her nipples harden as she jerks against me.

Not for nothing ... keeping a vibrator inside you after you come can tickle. I attempt to slip it out of me, but she shakes her head, smiling evilly at me. "One more time."

"I want to be able to walk."

"You know ... I think you really are a bottom."

Renewed strength surges through me and I pull on my reserve to flip her. The dildo never slips from me as I sit astride her. It goes even deeper and I groan, rubbing my hands over my breasts. "Touch me."

Her thumb arrives on my clit just when I'm ready to die and I make her a bottom within minutes.

I don't think she minds.

And I know that I don't.

"So, Mark," Erica says, cutting into her baked chicken. "Tell me about your parents."

Addison's fork clatters to the table and she swiftly retrieves it. "This is really good, Erica. You'll have to give me the recipe."

"Mark doesn't talk about his parents," I say innocently, picking up my wine glass. "The most I ever got out of him is that they were 'non-entities'. Whatever that means."

Across the table, Mark's eyes narrow slightly as he regards me. "They are not a part of my life. That's what it means."

"That's sad." Erica takes a bite of broccoli, innocently waving her fork to punctuate her next words. "I mean, I've never even met my biological father and I can't think of anything I want more. And he keeps making excuses not to come."

That's more than she has said to me about her father. Any time I broach the topic, she changes the subject. "What did he say?" I ask. "When he called earlier?"

"He said that his grandchild is sick." Filling her wine glass for the second time, Erica shrugs. "Apparently I have a sister and I'm an aunt and he can't be bothered to come and see me."

"I'm sorry," Addison tells her, reaching across the table to pat her hand. "Some people are assholes. Maybe you're better off not knowing him."

"No," I interject. "She's not. Even if he's an asshole, he's her father and family matters."

"To you," Mark says, shoving a fork full of stuffing into his mouth. "Because you have Ward and June Cleaver for parents, Callie. You've got the perfect parents and you grew up in a normal, stable house. Of course family matters to you. To the rest of the world, though, it sucks."

Erica nudges me under the table and I take a deep breath, trying to make it sound as shaky as possible. Here goes nothing. Operation Fix Our Friends is officially under way. I'm going straight to hell for this. "My parents broke up a few times," I lie. "My dad was married to his job and my mother couldn't take it. I used to, uhm, take Jasper and hide in the bedroom with the television on full blast so he couldn't hear them screaming at each other. It was hardest on him. He was two the first time that Daddy left and he wouldn't sleep in his crib the entire time that Dad was gone. He would climb out and come to my room, crying for him. It was hard."

"Santos and Lori Anne!?" Addison looks scandalized and I have to fight hard not to smile because clearly I could win an Oscar. I have even made my eyes all teary. Go me. "They - they separated? How long?"

Shit. Erica and I didn't plan that part. It's a good thing that I'm a fan of improv. I dramatically sip my wine and try to appear like I'm struggling with the pain of it all. I'm actually struggling for words. "I lost count. Sometimes it would be a few days. Sometimes weeks. When I was seventeen they were broken up for about six months. It was so horrible. Jasper's grades fell. I was already moody, but I'd fall apart in the blink of an eye and, you know, blame myself."

"Why would you blame yourself?" Mark demands. "It was their problem. Not yours."

"It's what kids do," Erica tells him, squeezing my hand emphatically in such a show of support that I swear she's channeling Meryl Streep. She looks down, eyes closed momentarily, and then lifts her head and looks at Mark. "They assign blame to themselves because their parents are their heroes. Even when they can't get it together. Parents are always heroes."

Mark puts his fork down and looks around the table. He studies me, then Erica, and finally lets his eyes land on Addison. "My parents didn't want kids. They liked to remind me all the time that I was a mistake. I wasn't part of their plan. I didn't blame myself for that and I certainly didn't regard them as heroes. I just went and found a family who didn't mind having me."

"You were adopted?" Erica asks, eyes wide. She wants that solidarity, I think. She wants something in common with someone. Anyone. Even Mark.

"Not legally," he replies. "Derek and I became best friends pretty young and I basically lived at his house. It was the first time I ever saw what a real family looks like. And they welcomed me, called me 'son', bitched at me if I broke curfew or got a bad grade. I was adopted in every way that counted."

"So, it didn't matter to them that you weren't theirs in every sense of the word." I keep my eyes on my plate, cutting up a piece of broccoli with as much care as I'd give an exposed nerve in the operating room. "Blood shouldn't matter. Kids just need to be accepted. Loved."

"That's true," Erica agrees. "People have to realize that when a child is involved ... it's not about them anymore. You have to do what you can to stay together and provide a stable home."

"Because instability," I add, "makes kids blame themselves. Jasper actually asked my mother if he did a bad thing after he chased my Dad's car down the driveway when he was five. It always felt like Dad was leaving us and not my mom."

Mark reaches for the wine bottle and splashes a liberal amount into his glass. "I can't imagine Santos leaving his family."

"Me either," says Addison.

"Even the best fathers make mistakes, Mark." Erica shrugs.

"And even the best mothers have stubborn pride, Addison," I say, stunned at how choked up I sound. Holy shit. I've almost convinced myself it really happened. "My mom wouldn't let him make amends a lot of the time. She expected him to be perfect when he was only ever a man. And even if I thought he could do not wrong ... she didn't agree. There were actually times that I hated her for keeping him away from me."

Addison and Mark look at one another and I catch Erica's eye. She winks at me. We are so fucking brilliant that we should get ourselves immortalized in bronze statues. How cool are we? Seriously? I don't even feel guilty for lying through my teeth either. What's a little white lie among friends. I cut another piece of broccoli and say, "Addison, aren't you having an exam tomorrow?"

She nods at me. "Ten thirty. You want to come with me? I'm nervous. I don't want to go alone."

I cut my eyes over at Mark, happy to see that he's glaring at her. "Can't. I have surgery at ten."

"Were you going to tell me?" Mark demands. "Or were you going to wait until the kid's born and the paternity test comes back before you let me be involved?"

"Does anyone want more chicken?" Erica offers. "It's really good. Moist."

Addison ignores her, all of her attention on Mark. "I don't have to wait, Mark. I can have the amnio done in a couple of weeks."

"No, you cannot!" Mark growls. "There are too many risks and -"

"And having a baby at my age also carries risks. I want to make sure that everything is okay and -"

"And what if it's not?" Slamming his knife on the table, Mark points a finger at her. "You are not thinking what I think you're thinking. Please tell me that abo-"

"No! And don't point your finger at me!" Addison smacks his hand down. "Even if there was a problem ... I'm having this baby. I want this baby."

"You're not doing an amnio, Addison. I mean it."

"Since when do you have dominion over my body?"

"The baby is mine. I have dominion over that."

"Could you pass the bread? Mark?" I wait for him to oblige, but he doesn't. I push myself to my feet to retrieve it and then hiss as pain surges through my loins. The third time with the alien penis was pushing it, I think. I cross my legs, then uncross them and grab the bread, easing back onto the wooden chair.

The annoyance has vanished off Mark's face. Now he looks like a kid in a candy store. "You guys found my gift, huh?"

"Shut up," I snap, mortification racing through my veins.

"Oh my god! You did!" Mark throws his head back and laughs heartily.

I feel all the blood rush to my head and when Erica clears her throat I know that she's just as red as I am. Addison looks back and forth between us and says, "What gift? What am I missing?"

Mark is still laughing when he says, "You like your bright yellow vibrator so much that I bought Erica one for her birthday."

Addison, who has just taken a big sip of water, spits it out all over the place and because I'm sitting across from her, I get the brunt of it. "MARK SLOAN!" she yells. "YOU DID NOT!"

"Oh, I did! And I guess they did, too. I thought you looked a little bow legged earlier, Cal, but I wasn't sure."

"Seriously?" Addy raises a brow, studying me, then Erica. "Wow."

"Stop. Picturing. It. Perv," I growl menacingly, returning to my broccoli. I cut another piece up and push it around on my plate in an attempt to make it appear that I've eaten it.

Mark laughs a little harder. "She's not the pervert, Callie."

"You are the pervert for giving it to them!" Addison assures him. "And don't sit over there acting like it's funny because you like playing with my toys and -"

"Awww, Mark, do you like a little French tickling up the -" Erica begins.

"Absolutely not!" The smile has vanished from Mark's face and unless I'm mistaken, his ears are turning just as red as mine undoubtedly are. "I like using them on her. And before any of you bitches can tell me that I do that because I can't get the job done ... I'm not threatened by it. A little variety keeps a relationship fresh. And she's kinky. Okay?"

"We're in a relationship?" Addison asks softly. "Because I thought -"

"Of course we are!" Mark's voice is loud now. "I bought you a dog! Only men in relationships do that!"

"Who told you that!?"

"It was on Oprah! And you can't give it back, Addison, because I checked with the apartment complex and I can't have pets. And ... I'm going to opt out of my lease and buy a place," Mark tells her. "And you, your dog, your toys and my baby are welcome to come, too. We need a huge yard. If this kid is anything like you it'll need plenty of room to run around in."

The smile that Addison gives him is, quite possibly, the prettiest that I've ever seen.

Under the table, Erica's foot rubs over mine and I lift my toes, stroking against hers.

It's wrong to gloat and let's face it ... I'm still too mortified to attempt it ... but Addison and Mark are officially in a relationship and since I'm in one ... I can say that's the best place to be.

And mean it.

"Are you going to actually eat the broccoli at some point?" Erica asks me suddenly.

I jump, busted. "Uhm ... no?"

"You really are a lost cause." Erica smiles at me. "And I don't mind."

After Addison and Mark leave, Erica and I take advantage of the hot tub. It's so cold outside that our breath mingles with the steam from the tub but we create enough heat with our heavy petting that we don't freeze. I'm sitting on top of her, my legs around her waist when I say, "You're an aunt. Do you have a niece or a nephew?"

She stiffens just a little and smoothes warm water over my shoulder. "Both, actually. Twins. The boy has the flu. He's in the hospital because he has asthma and was having trouble breathing."

"And is your dad coming soon?"

"I don't know."

"What did he say?"

"Nothing really."

"You were on the phone longer than 'nothing'."

"Callie, I really don't want to talk about it." She shifts a little, pulling me a little further under the water so that my arms are covered. "You have goose bumps."

I rub the front of her neck with my thumb, tracing the pulse there. "We could go and see him."

"Stop." It's impossible to ignore the look of warning she gives me. I know it well. I decide not to push the topic and she's so grateful that she kisses me, wrapping her arms a little tighter around my waist. "Cal?"

"What?"

"You really are sore, aren't you?"

"I really am."

"I'm sorry."

"Hey, I'm not complaining." I touch her cheek, lifting her eyes to mine. "But I'm not really asking you to do it again any time soon either. I - I like that we're soft, you know? Even if we're rough ... we're still soft."

She nods at me. "I like that, too."

"But I have to admit ... the little harness thing was hot. I may like that more than your blue panties."

"Surely not."

"I don't know. Maybe you should put those on later so I can be sure."

Laughing, she splashes water in my face. "You are incorrigible."

"It's one of the many talents I possess."

I kiss her again and she hugs me, clinging to me a little harder than she ever has before. "I love you, Lee."

"I love you, too."

She sags against me a little, angling her face so that it's in the crook of my neck and out of the wind that has picked up. "I really thought that he was coming."

"I know."

"And he didn't."

"I'm sorry."

"I wanted to be in control earlier. With you. That's what that was."

"I know that, too."

"And you let me?"

"I can't think of anything I wouldn't let you do. If I thought it's what you needed."

The hitch in her breathing proves that she's crying. And I can't bring myself to watch her so I simply hang onto her ... as tightly as I can ... because she deserves to know that some people value her.

And would never willingly let her go.

Even if she wields a scary alien penis.

When Jasper was eight and I was eighteen ... he tried on my graduation cap and gown. It was patented royal blue and the tassel had orange and white in it. It was too long and the hat was ill fitting, but he wanted his picture made in it all the same. I pulled out the trusty Polaroid and he hammed it up, rolling a newspaper in his hand to act as his diploma. I have one of those pictures, worn and cracked, in the inside pocket of my purse. Sometimes I forget that it's there and I'll randomly find it when I'm searching for something or if, God forbid, I buy a new purse and have to change the contents around. It used to fill me with sadness when I looked at that picture because Jasper never got to graduate. He never got to deal with teenage drama and dating and he never got to wear a cap and gown of his own.

I take that photo out of my purse now and when I look at it ... it fills me with hope.

It's been three weeks since Erica's birthday.

Only three weeks.

Twenty one days.

And the change in my brother is astonishing.

Halloween decorations have gone up in the hospital and he's noticing little things that he never would have noticed before. Monsters were never something that stuck in his head, but now, when I take his hand and we walk in the hallway, he points out Dracula and Frankenstein and he calls them by name. I'm sure I have Cristina to thank for explaining vampire mythology to him. I currently have a bruise on my neck where Jasper bit me after announcing that he was going to suck my blood and turn me into a bat. He's no longer hooked up to an IV and he's allowed outside for short periods of time, but he has to wear a helmet. Because of that, he opts to stay indoors and asks a steady stream of questions about everything under the sun.

You don't really understand how much can change in fifteen years until you're set free from the chains that kept you bound.

Jasper wants to know about cars and airplanes. He's obsessed with watching action movies and he gasps in all the right places and covers his eyes when things are tense. He understands, but instead of being a five year old trapped inside the body of a twenty five year old man ... he's ten. He wants to skateboard, but he can't control his gangly arms and legs because his mind hasn't grown into his body yet. And he's not perfect. He has moments where he lapses back into his old speech patterns or asks me about school and no matter how many times we explain it ... he refuses to believe that he's an adult. When he saw himself in the mirror for the first time, he slapped the glass and said he was ugly and bald.

I told him he was handsome.

He told me that I was pretty.

And then he cried because I did and it scared him.

Little by little, piece by broken piece, Jasper Torres is becoming a man. This is what I wanted, but watching things overwhelm him is hard to do. Mark bought him a Gameboy and no matter how he tried, Jazz couldn't control his fingers enough to play it. Erica finally took it from him and calmed him down before a tantrum erupted. And believe me, there have been plenty of those. Whenever Derek wheels the stimulator into the room, Jasper tries to flee and he'll beg for them not to hurt him until my parents have to leave the room. They can't handle it. They can't listen to him plead like that. It's hard for me to watch, but I do. I asked for this and I'll stop it if I have to.

The strangest thing about Jasper's recovery is the role that Izzie Stevens plays in it. She was released a week ago, but she's still on medical leave. Every day she appears, however, and every day she has a new puzzle or coloring book for Jasper. She'll sit with him on the floor of his room for hours, putting puzzles together, showing him picture books and asking him what different animals are and she even reads him comic books. I was very, very happy when he told her that she didn't do the voices as good as Yellow, but I'm trying to work through that. I'm also trying to work through the fact that Jasper is more independent now. He doesn't need me. He doesn't rush to me or fling himself into my arms every time I appear. Letting him go this time is bittersweet. I had no choice the first time because the ocean took him and gave him back wrong, but I wanted him to grow up. And growing up means growing apart.

It hurts all the same.

What hurts even more is the fact that Gavin Freakin' Cole has put together a variety show for the stupid fund raiser and has me singing not one, not two, but several songs. One of those, God help me, I'll be doing with him. It's a duet that he penned himself and while I would never tell him this ... it's actually kinda pretty. Maybe he has another talent that is just as impressive as his ability to annoy the ever loving HELL out of me.

What also annoys me is the fact that rehearsals for this orgy of humiliation will begin right after Halloween.

And I really have much better things to do with my time.

Like Erica.

Who is apparently working late.

I glance at the large clock in the waiting room and shut my iPod off, shifting uncomfortably. Forty five minutes really isn't that much time until you've been on your feet all day, you're hungry, and your ass is numb from the uncomfortable seats. Gavin should buy better chairs for the hospital. That's what we should raise funds for. I get to my feet, hell bent on paging Erica and run straight into a broad, sturdy chest.

"Ooomph," I grunt, holding my hands up. "I am so sorry! I never watch where I'm going."

"It's quite all right, miss."

Where have I heard that voice? I look up at the gray haired man and gasp. His eyes are blue. Just the right shade of blue. A shade of blue that I plan on looking at for the rest of my life. His nose is like hers and when he purses his lips ... a dimple appears in his chin.

Erica's father.

Is here.

Rick Salinger.

"Do you work here?" he asks. "Miss?"

"Yes. Are you looking for Erica?"

He does a double take on me. "How did you -"

"You look like her. Or ... she looks like you." I extend my hand. "I'm Callie Torres. It's nice to meet you."

"Oh! You're Callie!" He takes my hand, squeezing it gently with both of his. "My ... daughter has told me about you. She said you were beautiful. It's nice to see that she's not a liar."

I smile at him. This? This is Mark Sloan in thirty years. Rick is smooth, he's composed, and he's here.

Oh my god.

He's here.

The elevator dings behind him and I know ... I just know ... that Erica will be on it. The same way that I feel an aching in my stomach when she's out of sight for too long ... I get a fluttering in my chest when she's nearby. I can't explain it. It's just there. I hear her boots on the floor and it's crazy that I'm so familiar with her that I even recognize her gait. I step to the left and see that she's checking her phone. I have to speak fast.

"Look, Mr. Salinger, I don't know why you're here, but if you hurt her it will be the very last thing you do."

His caterpillar like eyebrows dance upward and a grin that's almost identical to hers, complete with a slightly crooked bottom tooth, spreads over his face. "I can assure you ... I'm properly chastened. Nicely done."

"I'm not playing around." My ire is definitely rankled by his dismissive banter and I cross my arms over my chest. "You hurt her by not showing up for her birthday and she got over that because you can't control the weather, but you should have come afterwards."

"I'm here now."

"Then you better make it count."

I become officially enraged when he pats my cheek, then pinches it. "I like you."

"The jury is still out on you, Judge," I reply, swatting his hand away. "Here she comes. And just in case Erica didn't mention it ... I break bones for a living. And a man your age is probably pretty brittle. One toe out of line, Mister, and snap."

"I'll make sure that my toes and my bones are well behaved."

"See that you do."

My phone rings and Leona Lewis warbles about 'Bleeding Love' (which Erica doesn't understand at all, she hates the song) and I quickly silence it, stepping around Rick. Erica smiles beautifully at me and then it fades when she sees the man standing to my left. She knows him. She recognizes him the same way I did. Even if we didn't have a grainy black and white photo ... she would know him anywhere. Drawing up short, she looks at the doors of the hospital and then back at Rick. She's debating whether or not to run. I don't blame her. I'm debating whether or not I can pick her up and dart into the night quicker than Flash Gordon.

I start toward her, but she comes my way fast. I actually take a step back because there's a look on her face that I've really never seen before ... and then she's hugging her father and he's hugging her and I really didn't expect that, but I like it much better than going to bail her out of jail for assault.

Apparently Erica Hahn has not lost her ability to surprise me.

We head to dinner with her father. She chooses the restaurant on top of the Archfield and I don't know if it's because she's comfortable there or if she wants to impress him. Either way, we find ourselves in the secluded round booth that overlooks the city and I watch her closely as she interacts with this man who may or may not be worth his weight in salt. It's disconcerting to see them side by side. Even their mannerisms are similar. They butter their bread on the inside after cutting it neatly instead of slathering the top like me. They both trace the rim of their glass when they're paying attention to one another and they both order salmon and salads. I go straight for red meat, earning a reproachful glare from Erica, but she refrains from mentioning it.

Like an open book, Erica relays her life story. I notice that she leaves out a few of the hairier details and clear my throat. She gives me her full attention, but I only have eyes for her father. He's charming. He's TOO charming if you catch my drift. I can spot a snake oil salesman a mile away. Well, okay ... I may not have judged O'Malley's character very well, but I learned the hard way. And I don't think this ... stranger ... should get the condensed and watered down version of Erica's life. I just don't. Because he could have prevented it. He could have saved her from it.

"Callie?" Erica prompts. "Did you want to say something?"

"Yeah. Rick," I begin, taking a deep breath, "what she's not telling you is that she went to bed hungry most of the time, lived in squalor, and was emotionally abused up until the moment she left for college. I don't know about her, but I think that I would like to hear why you let that happen."

I see Erica's mouth drop open out of the corner of my eye, but I don't acknowledge it. If there's hell to pay later on ... I'll pay it. But right now I want answers to the questions that she doesn't seem to want to ask.

Across the table, Rick clears his throat and says, "I - I do owe her an explanation."

"Yeah, you do," I agree. "I'm sure she's all ears."

"I need to go to the restroom," Erica announces suddenly. "Callie? Do you?"

"I'm fine."

"No, you need to go to the restroom," she presses, giving me a steely look of determination. "Now."

"It's okay, Erica." Salinger puts his hand on hers, rubbing with his thumb. I notice that there are age spots there. Lots of them. "Callie's actually right and since she already threatened to break my brittle bones ... I'm going to oblige her."

"You didn't," Erica growls at me. "Torres!"

Ow. Use of the surname. That's bad.

"I'm sorry," I tell her. "But I'm the one who saw you after he repeatedly broke his promise to come here and -"

"Stop. Talking." Erica holds up a hand. "I mean it, Callie."

Rick clears his throat, signals the waiter, and asks for another bottle of wine. Erica has her arms crossed over her chest and I realize that her body language mirrors my own. I can feel the tension rippling off her in waves and I really hope she can feel mine, too. When the waiter leaves to bring us another Merlot, Rick looks at Erica, then at me. "I didn't know that Erica had been given to her aunt and uncle until right before she graduated high school. It was my understanding that her mother was putting her up for adoption and had found a lovely, wealthy family in Lincoln to take her."

"Why put her up for adoption at all?" I ask, trying to appear nonplussed about crossing the line. "Why didn't you take her? You're obviously a lot older than her mother was and -"

"I was married," Rick replies. "I was married and already had two sons. Mary Elizabeth, Erica's mother, babysat for us and -"

I snort, shaking my head. "That's rich. You seduced your babysitter?!"

"Do you want to hear the story or insult me?" Rick cocks his head to one side and when I don't reply, he goes on. "Mary Elizabeth was sixteen and she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. I was older. A lot older. I knew it was wrong. I knew it was illegal. I knew that it was morally bankrupt, but I had an affair with her. It lasted for roughly six months and then I ended it because my wife found out. Mary Elizabeth told me a week later that she was pregnant and I paid for all of her medical care and told her which adoption agencies were the most reputable. You have to understand ... I was well respected. I was running for District Attorney. I had political aspirations. And this girl ... this girl from the poorest family in our town was pregnant with my child."

"You didn't mind that she was poor when you were having sex with her," Erica says suddenly. "Right?"

"I was infatuated. And I've already said that I was wrong." Rick stops talking when the waiter reappears and fills all of our glasses. I drink half of mine down in one gulp. Erica does the same. Rick doesn't touch his and focuses on Erica instead. "After Mary Elizabeth gave birth ... I went to the hospital and I saw you. Erica, I held you and I was proud of you. You were beautiful. You had ... my eyes. My boys didn't have my eyes and I wanted you. I wanted to take you home with me, but my wife at the time wouldn't accept that. You would have suffered at her hand. She was not the kindest woman and that's why I was drawn to your mother. Mary Elizabeth was kind. She saw life in a different way. She made me feel young again.

"So, I let you go. I let you go with the understanding that you were being adopted by a decent family. It ripped my heart out." He does sip his wine now and I notice that his chin is trembling. It looks EXACTLY like Erica's when she's about to cry and hating him really would be easier if he didn't look so damn much like her. "Seventeen years went by. I had moved from District Attorney into the Judge's chambers and I was well on my way to running for Congress. My wife died and I wish I could say that I was sad to see her go, but I wasn't. I decided to find you. I found out that your mother had died and visited her grave one day while you were there. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that you were my daughter. I followed you and saw the trailer home you parked your bicycle at and I wanted to rush in and save you, but I couldn't."

"Why not?" I lean forward, glaring at him. "You had every right to 'rush in and save her'. You're her father."

"And an illegitimate love child would have ruined my chances at a career." Rick drains his glass and sets it aside. When he touches Erica on the arm and she looks at him ... I'm tempted to fling myself between them to make whatever he says next hurt me before it can hurt her. "I did the only thing I could do. I made sure that you got a scholarship to any college you wanted and I did the best I could to give you everything you needed. Every time you requested financial aid ... they simply dipped into what I set up for you. That's why you didn't have to pay it back. It wasn't a filing mistake like they told you. I tried to make amends."

"What about after that?" Erica asks. "Why didn't you come and find me after that?"

"And shake your foundation? Throw you off your game? Complicate your life?" He touches the curl in the front of her hair that always mesmerizes me. "You don't know how happy I was to see that you had left that note behind. I visit your mother's grave every couple of weeks and I called you the instant I saw it. I couldn't believe that you possibly wanted me as much as I had wanted you.

"I know that I can't make it up to you, honey. I saw the way you lived. I know what your 'parents' were like. I actually presided over a couple of their misdemeanor cases before I knew that they had you." He puts his hand on her shoulder and squeezes. "But I would love the opportunity to know you. I can't change the past, but the future is wide open. And I've got a few days to stay here. What do you say? Is that okay with you?"

Erica's response is to nod. I think that'll be the extent of her reaction to his words, but it's not. I watch her lean forward and put her head against his shoulder. He hugs her with both arms, kissing the top of her head and a huge lump forms in my throat as I watch tears trace a path down his wrinkled cheek.

I put my napkin on my plate and stand up ... leaving them alone.

Intruding on something so personal feels wrong.

I loiter in the bathroom, pretending to be retrieving a tampon every time the door opens. When it swings open the fifth time, Erica is standing there. She's obviously been crying and every fiber in my being wants to close the distance between us and comfort her, but she shoots me a look and walks past me into the stall. I lean back against the wall and say, "Okay, in my defense ... he had that coming."

"Did you really threaten to break his bones?"

"Brittle bones," I correct. "And yes. Yes, I did."

"And did you actually tell him that you would kill him if he hurt me?"

"Something like that."

She opens the stall and moves to the sink, looking at me in the mirror. "You made quite an impression."

"I'm not sorry."

Snatching several towels from the holder she turns around and glares at me while she dries her hands. I feel like I'm being lined up before a firing squad and really ... the last thing either of us need is a fight because we've really been doing well. She tosses the towels and puts her hands on her hips. "You're not sorry?"

Oh god. I really shouldn't have said that. "I could ... possibly be moderately sorry, but I'm not COMPLETELY sorry."

"Do you think I'm pissed?"

"Completely," I assure her.

She walks across the bathroom, her heels clicking on the tile, and stops in front of me. "Look at me."

"I don't need to look at you to hear you yell at me, Erica. I assure you I can hear just fine."

"Look. At. Me."

I sigh and meet her gaze. "I'm looking."

A smile breaks over her features and she leans into me, pushing me back against the wall. "You made quite an impression on me, too."

"Huh?"

"I like this protective thing. It's kinda hot." She rubs my cheek, still smiling. Against my ear, she whispers, "Hot enough to take you right now."

"I'm stunned enough to let you."

"I'll refrain," she replies, pushing away from the wall. "And because we're going to have a houseguest ... we'll have to abstain for a few days."

"What ... no ... no, there should be no abstaining. I can be very quiet."

"I can't." She shrugs innocently and presses a soft kiss on my lips. "And this will teach you that you shouldn't run your mouth. Because when your mouth runs ... it's too busy to do anything else."

"But you said it was hot!"

"Are you turned on right now?"

"Uh ... yeah."

"Then we're even." She holds out her hand. "Let's go."

"CAL-LEE!"

"Hey, Buddy!" I brace myself because Jasper comes running down the hall. Instead of ramming into me like he usually does, he stops a few feet away and walks very slowly, almost comically. "What are you doing?"

"Walk don't run," he replies, looking at me like I just asked the most stupid question known to mankind. "Now I can hug you."

"Okay." I open my arms and he throws his around me. He's been outside. I can smell it on him ... freedom, open air, happiness. I'm sorry that I missed it. The hospital doesn't feel right now that Erica has is taking a few days off to reconnect with her father. Poor Webber. He actually told me that he's going to put a stop to all vacation time since he hasn't had one in years. But he was laughing when he said it. "How are you today?"

"Good. Sleepy."

"Are you?"

"Yeah. Vampire movie scared me last night. I not sleep too much."

"Vampires are not real, Jasper. They're fake."

"Fake. Not real."

"You can't be scared about fake things."

"Oh yes I can. I was. Duh!"

Did he just say 'duh' to me. I smack him playfully on the arm. "You want to know what's real?"

He scratches his head and stares up at the ceiling for a second. "My friend is real."

"You have a friend?"

"Emma." He points down the hall and I turn in time to see Emma Foster waving from her father's arms. She spots me and grunts, kicking her feet to be put down. Mr. Foster relents and I bend over to catch her as she comes charging toward me like she's been fired out of a canon. All the swelling is gone. The bruises have faded. And even though her tongue is still lolling just enough to make her drool, I swear she's smiling at me.

"Walk don't run, Emma!" Jasper tells her wagging his finger. "You fall down and cry."

She shakes her head and peels the sticker off her shirt, holding it out to him. He pulls his own sticker off and they trade. He points at the cartoon dog on his new sticker and says, "Booty goes 'ruff' and 'grrrr'."

He punctuates the 'grrrr' by goosing Emma in the ribs and so help me God ...

She laughs.

It's not a wheezing.

It's not a grainy sucking of air past any tubes.

She laughs.

It's not a normal laugh. It's not a giggle or a chuckle, but it's like a million tinkering bells to me and I can only stare at her in shock. She catches me looking at her and rubs her tiny fingers over her jaw and then gives me a thumbs up, nodding her head. It's really unprofessional to cry in front of patients or, you know, pick them up and cradle them in your arms, but I seem hell bent on breaking all the rules. When she puts her head against mine and laughs again ... my eyes are so full of tears that I'm swimming. I have to struggle to breathe. I walk down the hall with her, toward the window so that I can collect myself and Jasper follows, talking about vampires and Halloween, which is tomorrow.

Gazing out over Seattle ... I think that it's really Halloween every day.

We all knock on stranger's doors and ask them for a little kindness.

I've been tricked quite a few times, but I've been treated more.

And everyone wears costumes, I guess. We pigeonhole ourselves into characters, mere sketches of who we really are those caricatures never fully represent us. Erica was the 'badass'. I was the 'loner'. Mark was the 'man whore'. Izzie was the 'husband stealer'. And Karev ... Alex Karev was the 'hot head'.

I think we've all put our costumes away, though.

Erica has a heart like nothing I've ever seen before and she's definitely a badass, but she's also got a grace about her that leaves me spellbound. She's kind. Hell, she generously teaches now and when I ask her about it ... she says that I taught her and she wants to pay it forward.

And I not longer seek out the darkest corners of the hospital to dwell alone in. I want to surround myself with the people that I love and leave enough room for new people to come in and greet me. I guess maybe I don't hate people anymore. If I can find myself growing fond of Erica's father ... anything can happen.

Mark's little black book is a thing of the past, too. He put money down on a house with a cobblestone patio and spends his days looking at barbecue grills and feeling Addison's stomach. He said he wants a girl because he's not used to only one woman in his life, but I can tell that he loves it.

Izzie ... Izzie wouldn't steal anything, I don't think. She gives so much of herself to Jasper, to my parents, and ... to me. In her own way she's carefully erasing past hurts by walking Jasper through a complicated new life. And Karev was only a hot head when he had to be. He's also the man who died believing that he was going to step up and be a father to Izzie's baby. He died on his way to pick out a crib. I overheard Izzie telling Jasper that Alex was holding her baby in heaven. I need to believe that.

I think the best thing any of us can be for Halloween is ourselves.

Because we worked our asses off to get here.

Didn't we?


	37. Chapter 37

The children's ward at Seattle Grace hospital is always colorful and fun. The nurses who work that area are geniuses who always find a way to spark imagination, even in the sickest patients. Halloween on C-block, which is what we all call it, is my favorite time of the year. It's not just the candy (which I do admit that I love), it's the fact that at seven o'clock, we bring the outside in and leave all the parents sitting in rooms with an abundance of candy while we wheel, walk, and parade the children all around the wing to trick or treat. We use toilet paper to create mummies and I raid the local stores for last minute costumes. For an hour those kids forget that they're sick. They don't remember that they're in pain or that they have a surgery looming ahead of them. For sixty minutes ... they're kids. And being sick doesn't matter anymore.

I always feel like the biggest kid in the bunch because I've been front and center each of my six years at Seattle Grace. It happened because I got attached to a patient with bone cancer when I first started. His name was Colby Bernson and he was eight years old. He wanted to be a hockey player for Halloween and I postponed his surgery, a double amputation, so that he could walk and trick or treat one last time. He didn't trick or treat though ... he gave candy instead. When we opened him up a few days later we realized that the cancer had spread further and it wasn't operable. I broke the news as carefully as I could and then I sat in the utility closet and cried. In Miami, for Christmas, I bought him a snow globe with hockey pucks in it, but he died before I returned home. And that's how Halloween came to the C-block and that's why I overfill my shopping cart with candy, games, and costumes after I leave Jazz at the hospital playing Operation with Emma.

The sound of her laughter is still clinging to me when I open the door and hang my jacket on the hall tree. It's funny how you can find yourself submersed in everything you ever wanted. I'm drowning in my own happiness, I think. Jasper is healing. I've never been happier with the romantic aspects of my life. My career is on the right path and I heard Emma Foster laugh. That's all I wanted. When I held her in my arms and sang to her before her surgery, when I screwed her new jaw into place, when I braided her hair and kept my word ... I did so because I wanted to hear her laugh. And she gave that to me.

Life is good.

And short.

The grandfather clock in the corner is illuminated with a lamp and I can't believe how quickly the day got away from me. It's easy to lose track of time when your mind is so occupied, but now that I'm home ... I feel her everywhere. I take a second to look at my leather coat against Erica's beige cloth one. We are so completely different, yet so complimentary to one another that it shows through in every aspect of our lives. Our coats are different, yet they hang next to each other like they were always supposed to be arranged like that. I know that it must have been fate that brought us together and will keep us together. We are as different as we are the same and I wouldn't change that for all the money in the world. I take her coat down and bring the collar to my face, breathing her in and a huge lump fills my throat when I realize that the day will eventually come where one of us will leave the other for good. It settles in my stomach like fire and I wish that I had not spent so much time shopping for candy and Halloween stuff for the party because it's late and she's -

"I'm sure I smell better than that jacket."

- behind me.

I put it back on the hook, take a deep breath, and turn around. I'm sure that my smile looks genuine because it always is with her, but the look she gives me makes me think that she knows exactly what I was thinking. There really is never enough time. Not having her at work today left me feeling like I had misplaced something all day. No matter how distracted I was ... I felt her absence in my soul like a toothache. I hate it. She puts her wine glass down on the coffee table and pads to where I'm standing, her bare feet whispering against the hardwood. She's right. She does smell better than the jacket. She's lilacs and sweet red wine and I put my face against her neck as I hug her. "Bad day?" she asks, rubbing comforting circles on my back.

"Not really."

Leaning back, she cups my cheek. "What's wrong?"

"I haven't seen you for hours and I hate it."

"I know the feeling."

"I get that I have to share you with your dad, but do you think maybe you can come to the hospital tomorrow night? The kids are doing their Halloween thing and I'll be there late for that."

"I wouldn't miss it."

"Are you sure? I know that you want to spend as much time with him as you can and -"

"Hey, look at me." She waits until I give her my undivided attention. "You don't like to share and because I know that ... I will find a happy medium here."

"I share just fine, Yellow."

She laughs. "Yeah, right. Do we need to take a walk down memory lane?"

"Apparently."

"Well, let me see." She rests her hands on my hips, sliding her thumbs under my shirt to touch my skin. "You didn't like that I was friend's with Helen's mother, but I'll give you that one. You also didn't appreciate me spending time with Rachel's brother the night we went to the party for the group home. And you've made it very clear that you'd prefer being here alone with me than socializing with other people. Do you need me to continue?"

I make a face at her. "Fine. I don't share well."

"He's only here for a few days, baby. And then we can go right back into seclusion and be lusty hermits who only have eyes for each other."

"You make that sound like a bad thing."

"The first thing I loved about you, Callie, is that you don't like people either." She gives me a quick kiss. "But I really want to find out if my dad can be an exception to that rule. Okay?"

I grin at her. "You're really good at this communication thing."

"I'm really good at everything. Didn't you get the memo?"

"Memo? If someone wrote down all the stuff you're good at ... it would be thicker than the Bible."

"You're really good at getting in my pants, Torres."

"Is that an invitation?"

"It's more like a plea. From a sure thing."

"No time like the present to be a sure thing, Dr. Hahn."

"Dinner first. I know you. You didn't eat, did you?"

"Not yet."

The lump in my throat vanishes when she kisses me again. She pins me back against the door and massages my mouth with hers while her thumbs rub over my jaw, then down my neck. It makes me lightheaded and it's not the first or last time that she will intoxicate me, but it still takes my breath every single time she manages to do it. When she pulls back and nods at the fireplace I have to smile. The wood is crackling and I can see that she has put a tray of food in front of it. She loosely threads her fingers through mine as she leads me to the blanket and waits for me to sit down. She retrieves her glass, sits across from me, and taps the plate of lasagna that is already making my stomach gurgle in anticipation. "My dad made it. It's amazing. You'll like it."

"I'm sorry I missed dinner," I tell her, picking up the fork and slicing through the tender noodles. "How did it go?"

"Good." She watches me savor a fork full of lasagna and smiles when I moan rapturously. "I think it's safe to say that I inherited cooking from him. He's like a machine in the kitchen. It was unreal to watch him. He made the noodles from scratch and everything."

"Damn, that is impressive." I compliment Rick's cooking but wonder if Erica realizes that she could never be like a machine, in the kitchen or otherwise. Anyone who knows her knows how human she is, how full of love and devotion she can be when given the chance. And I wonder if Rick, in his machine-like state, is aware of that and if he knows just how deeply Erica has hurt because of his lack of presence in her life. I wonder if she realizes that only a machine could lack the humanity to claim what is rightfully theirs and take care of it.

No, she could never be a machine.

I devour half a slice of garlic bread, watching her intently. She's gazing at the fire like it's the most interesting thing she's ever seen. It reminds me of the night in Miami when we sat roasting marshmallows and she finally told me about her family. She had stared into the flames the same way that night and it's more than a little unnerving. "Are you okay? Yellow?"

She takes a deep breath and so help me God ... I can't help but admire the way she fills out her long sleeved t-shirt. I'm such a fucking pervert. She's clearly got something on her mind and the only thing I can think about it how nice Tigger looks pulled tightly across her chest. Walt Disney would be rolling over in his grave if he knew what I'd like to do with my tongue and what's currently concealed under Tigger. "I have two brothers and one sister. Ritchie is the oldest. He's ten years older than me. He is a lawyer who specializes in child welfare cases. He's also single and has never been married. Ryan is next. He's eight years older than me and he's married to a black woman that he met in Kenya. The twins are theirs. Hayden and Hartley are six."

"You have a sister, too. Right?" I keep my voice light because the sister came after Erica. And that's got to burn.

"Yeah. After his first wife died, my dad met a woman who was a lot younger than him and they got married. They had Vivian who is eleven years younger than me. She was Little Miss Nebraska, a beauty queen, a cheerleader, the homecoming queen, and she married a man who wound up beating her nearly to death. She lost her baby and her husband went to prison."

My eyes widen in shock and I nearly choke on my mouthful of pasta. "Oh my god."

"Dad was arrested for assaulting the husband at his sentencing four years ago. They dropped the charges though because the bastard actually laughed when Vivian was making her victim impact speech. He laughed at her, Callie, like it didn't matter. Like she didn't matter and their baby was nothing." Erica shakes her head, her blue eyes finding mine. "Dad retired right after that. I think maybe it was one of the stipulations of the charges being dropped. Apparently I inherited the ability to win friends and influence people from him, too. No one likes him."

"You're nothing like him."

Her pale eyebrows go up a notch. "No?"

"No."

"You don't see any similarities with my Dad?"

"None."

"He's got a mean streak, Callie."

"There's nothing mean about you. You have a tendency to be tough, unreadable, and occasionally nasty, but -"

"Are you referring to our sex life lately?"

I grin at her. "There is that and before you ask ... no ... I don't want to open up the box of sin again."

"Damn." She wrinkles her nose and my fingers itch to touch her, to brush her hair back, anything. She helps herself to my bread and adds, "I am like him a little. I fight for who I love."

I have to agree with her. She did that for me, after all. "I guess you do."

It almost pains me to admit that she does perhaps have something in common with him. Her ability to protect me, stand up for me, and fight for me no matter how wrong I am or how much she may disagree with the situation is one of the reasons why I love her so much. It's also one of the many things she's taught me in the short time we've been together. Though I had never been like that before her, I would gladly do the same things for her if the situation called for it.

"There are worst things me having something in common with my Dad, Cal."

"Yeah. I could have something in common with my mother."

"Oh god! Don't speak it out loud."

The ease with which she calls Rick 'Dad' doesn't sit well with me, but I understand it. She's accepted this man into our life with the same devotion that my mother had when Jasper was injured and came back wrong. All that mattered at the end of the day ... is that he came back. Crying over lost time really only steals the time that remains and makes you drown it with tears instead of color it with smiles and laughter. I make the decision in that moment to watch out for her at all costs ... because when you give your trust so quickly you're asking to be hurt, but I don't tell her that.

I can't tell her that.

Because Erica has a family and she's happy.

I still don't have to like him.

"He's invited us to visit his place in Nebraska for Christmas. I told him I didn't know because this is our first Christmas and that's the most important thing, but maybe afterward ... if you want ... we could go and meet everyone. Maybe for New Years."

I can see the hopefulness in her face and I force myself to smile. "I think that would be great."

Her head tilts just a little as she studies me. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"I'm positive."

She reaches across the tray, pushing a strand of hair off my cheek. "What did you do at work today?"

"I heard Emma Foster laugh."

Erica alone, out of everyone that I know, understands just how much I wanted that. Her eyes sparkle in the flickering light and I don't object when she moves the tray from between us. Kneeling in front of me, she takes my hand in hers and asks, "Was it incredible?"

"Everything in life is ... with you."

She gives me a grin that says 'Goofy' more than Tigger at the moment. And then she says the three words I can never hear enough from her, "I love you."

"I love you, too."

We leave the tray and the fire in favor of our bed.

I'm pleased to note that the disappearance of Tigger on her chest unleashes her inner wildcat.

We love quietly, but our hearts are like drums when we finally fall into a tangle of limbs and drift off to sleep.

Halloween can bring out the very best and the very worst in people. I'm happy that I am working the day and not the night rotation because by the time my shift ends, the truly idiotic people are filling the emergency room and the only thing I can think about is painting faces in the children's ward. My mother and father readily volunteered to help out and Jasper is bouncing on the balls of his feet when the elevator opens. He rushes toward me with his cape billowing behind him and it strikes me that the last Halloween we had together was when he was eight years old. He had dressed up as a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle and I had lamented my entire lack of a social life as we walked around the neighborhood together. I didn't dress in costume that night, but he told everyone that I was a movie star. And he gave me all the Smarties from his oversized pumpkin container because those were my favorite.

And that's what he holds out to me as he skids to a stop in front of me. There's a roll of Smarties in his palm and he grins at me, exposing his fake vampire teeth. This is so monumental that I can't say anything. Someone has drawn a widow's peak on his forehead and his skin has been powdered white to make him look like Dracula, but he remembered. I pretend to be scared for his benefit and he attempts to sink his fangs into me, but Gavin saves me at the last moment by presenting Jazz with an oversized sucker. I want to comment on the fact that Jazz remembered Smarties and thank him for being so sweet, but he takes the sucker, bellows 'thank you, Vin', and then runs back down the hallway telling Emma he has a lollipop she can have.

"How are you, Calliope?" Gavin asks, leaning back against the wall and crossing his arms over his chest.

He looks utterly ridiculous in the skeleton costume he's wearing ... if it can be called a costume. I'm tempted to touch it to see if it's been painted on because his biceps are bulging all over the place. Glancing down at the other bulges he is proudly displaying makes me think that he would be better suited dancing on a bar while horny women clap for him. "Did you not get the memo about this being a kid's party, Elvis?"

"It's not my fault I'm so well endowed that I can't hide it."

"Ew."

"Why aren't you in costume?"

I point at the gaggle of children who are gearing up to make their rounds. "It's their time."

"Now I feel overdressed." He tugs at the collar of his costume, but it's sitting against him like a second skin. "Let me paint your face."

"What? No!"

"Come on! You need to be festive! If I can parade around here in a leotard then you can -"

"It looks more like a cat suit," I assure him.

"I fill it out well. I saw you looking."

"Whatever." I shake my head and Gavin ... actually ... fills my face with silly string, laughing as my bottom jaw drops open and I take a mouthful of it.

It's rancid and I choke on it.

"IT IS ON!" I sputter, trying to wrestle the can away from him. I succeed in making a jet of string go up his nose as we each grapple for control of the can.

The children are thoroughly amused. I'm aware that they've bull penned us and are laughing like crazy as Gavin and I 'fight' with each other. Random shots of silly string keep going off, some hitting nothing, some decorating the kids and I finally trip him with a carefully placed foot and shove. He drops to his ass and immediately hooks me behind my knee, making me fall beside him. I realize that I have the can just as a little girl dressed as an Indian launches herself at me. Two toddlers follow suit and I'm stuck on the floor, unable to shoot Gavin, while a half dozen tiny hands try to pull the string from my hair.

"You okay, Lee?" I'm stunned when Jasper grips me under the arms and pulls me up. He's strong. I don't think I realized just how strong he is until my feet dangle off the ground for a split second before he lets me go. I think maybe I'm guilty of underestimating him. Again. "You hurt?"

"I'm okay, Jazz." My underarms are throbbing from the death grip he had on me, but I don't tell him that.

Jasper points a finger at Gavin. "You are not supposed to fight with girls! Idiot!"

Daaaaamn. How did he know what an idiot is? It fits Gavin so well.

Gavin gets to his feet and smiles sheepishly. "Sorry, Jasper. It won't happen again."

"It better not!" Jazz tells him, narrowing his eyes menacingly. "My dad is right over there, too, you know!?"

"Yes, I know."

"You behave!" Jasper glares at the Gavin, then turns around and joins the other kids.

Gavin watches my brother with wide eyes, then shoots me a withering look. "I almost got my ass kicked just now."

"Pretty much."

"I'm going to play with the little people. I think they'll appreciate me more."

I shake my head as he shambles down the hallway in his body hugging costume and proceeds to entertain the sick children by trying to steal their candy. If anyone else was doing it ... it would be moderately endearing, but the fact that it's Gavin hoisting Emma into the air and making her 'laugh' does nothing for me. I'm immune to his charm, but I can see that I'm the only one. Izzie, Cristina, and Addison are watching him with their mouth's agape. I sidle up to the nurse's station and lean against it. It takes the three women a few seconds to notice me and when they do ... they all pretend to be engrossed in paperwork.

"Busted," I murmur, helping myself to a piece of chocolate from the oversized dish on the counter. "So busted."

"He's hot," Addison says, casting a glance back at Gavin. "I haven't seen a body like that since -"

"This morning? And you saw a much better one," Mark offers, popping up behind her on the other side of the station. His nod to Halloween is red devil horns and he's painted a black triangle into the stubble on his chin. The smile he gives Addison is broad and charming and I can only shake my head because she has forgotten that anyone else in the room exists at all. It helps that he's holding a fat baby who is dressed in an Eeyore costume and I watch as it latches onto Mark's ear and tugs. Now that is endearing. He contorts his face in pain and the baby giggles like mad, tugging even harder. "Ow! I knew the costume was a cover for something more sinister."

Addison's no longer looking at Gavin. She's watching Mark make faces at the baby and if she wasn't already madly in love with him ... I think this would cause her to fall head over feet. Addison confided in me earlier that Mark is retiring the bedroom suite that I helped him pick out to the guest room. He had chosen (with Addison's help) a large four poster ensemble. That's what he originally wanted with me, too. I'm the one who liked the sleigh bed. I've never been happier about being relegated to 'guest' status in my life. They're happy, Mark and Addison. The only thing better than coming full circle ... is watching someone else do the same.

Cristina catches me watching the two of them and rolls her eyes, elbowing me in the side. "Who's the old guy with Hahn?"

I hear Erica laughing behind me and turn to see her introducing Rick to Chief Webber. The expression on Rick's face makes me think that Webber is pouring it on thick, gushing about his daughter, and then the Chief takes Erica by the elbow and leads her from the hallway. "That's her father."

"Looks like Webber is taking her out of here before she can kill Gavin."

"What do you mean?"

"She didn't like his costume, Callie." Yang gives me a pointed look. "Or the way he was all over you ... if you know what I'm saying."

"Oh. Shit."

"Yeah. You're in it."

"I'll be back."

Rick sees me coming and meets me halfway, beaming. He's handsome. I'll give him that much. He's wearing a black turtleneck under his red jacket and it makes him look almost regal. His blue eyes are darting left and right, taking in the festivities and I don't want to smile at him, but damn it ... it's infectious. This place, these kids, all of it. "Erica was apparently needed in an emergency surgery," he tells me over the cacophony of children's voices. "The physician who is currently working needs a break."

"That's too bad. She was looking forward to participating tonight," I reply, pointing down the hallway at my parents. "My mother and father are here. Would you like to meet them?"

"Certainly, certainly." He drapes an arm over my shoulder and it shouldn't make my skin crawl, but it does.

I'm still picturing Erica's sixteen year old mother being seduced by his charm, by him. She was a child. I can only imagine that seeing wealth when you're used to poverty is overwhelming. As shocked as I was by Erica's childhood homes ... I'm sure it was just as shocking for her mother to see Rick's abundance of material things. I wonder if he wooed her with the promise of something ... more than what she had. Because anything was more than what she had. I also wonder if it was the breaking of those promises Rick made to her that caused Erica's mother to turn to the only other solace she knew: drugs and alcohol. I wonder if her mother went to her grave feeling duped, played by a powerful judge with intriguing blue eyes.

My father warned Erica about Latin lovers.

Whose place is it to warn her about Rick? Mine? Do I want that role?

"My grandkids would love this," he continues, unaware of my internal dialogue. "It's too bad they can't be here to join in."

"Erica told me all about them. They sound amazing."

"They're my life." He pats my arm jovially, adding, "Erica said that the two of you have every intention of having a family of your own. I'm glad that you haven't let your lifestyle rob you of all normalcy in that regard."

I stiffen and try to stop walking, but he's still guiding me. "What is that supposed to mean?"

My mother hears my voice and turns around before he can answer. She stands on her tiptoes, hugging me, and I think maybe working with the kids today has given her new purpose. She's glowing. "Hi, baby," she says, reaching out to take my hand. "I understand now why you say that this is the best time of year in the hospital."

My dad joins us in time for me to make the introductions and I watch him greet Rick, pumping his hand with both of his like they're long lost friends. Mom greets him in the refined Southern way that she never could breed into me. She extends her hand and practically swoons when Rick plants a kiss on the back of it. My father's eyes narrow slightly and I can't help but think that jealousy is as constant as love no matter how many years you spend together.

I look around for Jasper but he's at the far end of the hallway with Emma so I don't interrupt him. Instead, I kneel down and paint cat whiskers on a little girl's face and stand back to watch the progression begin. The children are practically vibrating with anticipation as Cristina turns up scary music. It's hard to remember that these kids are sick and that some of them won't be here next year at all because they're all so alive in this moment.

It's magic.

I take a ton of pictures with my cell phone and I notice that Mom is doing the same while Rick talks to my father about ... whatever it is that old men talk about. They're both thoroughly amused with one another and their rich hearty laughter causes me to envision the two of them laughing with a little boy that Erica and I created or arguing over who gets to dance with our little girl at her birthday party.

Rick catches my eye and winks at me.

I look away ... determined not to fall under his spell.

It's Webber who makes the suggestion of taking Erica's father to the gallery so that he can see Seattle's premiere cardio surgeon in action. I happen to know Erica well enough to know that she wouldn't particularly like that, but I can't back out of it because Rick is eager to watch. I count my lucky stars when we sit down and the surgery is wrapping up. George is working with Erica and she is asking him a litany of tough questions that would make me nervous, but he has ready answers for her. If she's impressed with his knowledge she doesn't let on and I can tell that Rick is blown away with the way that she commands her operating room. His eyes move back and forth between her and the monitor on the wall that shows a close up of her hands.

The observation deck is empty except for the two of us and I shift in my seat a little when I realize that I'm suddenly more interesting to him than his own daughter. "What?"

He leans forward just a little, just enough for me to smell the bitterness of stale cognac on his breath. "You don't like me very much."

It's a statement, not a question. I meet his eyes, undaunted. "You haven't given me a lot of reason to like you, Rick."

"Do you always judge people before you get to know them?"

"I'd say your reputation preceded you."

"I see." He gives me a cocky smile. "You are perhaps referring to the background investigation you had performed on me?"

"I am perhaps referring to the fact that you abandoned your daughter and the child that you had impregnated."

"It was a different time back then. It was -"

"It was gross. And wrong."

"People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. A lot of people would call your lifestyle the same."

I narrow my eyes. "People who speak in clichés do so because they don't have anything original to say. Or because they have something to hide."

"I have nothing to hide. You saw to that by having your family investigate me. And just for the record ... I think it would behoove you to extend a little bit of courtesy to me. I haven't done anything to you. And if Erica can be polite to your mother then you can do the same for me."

I gasp. "What are you -"

"She told me everything about your life together." Rick looks down into the operating room and waves at Erica. She lifts her hand in response and I can see that she's smiling up at us. "She loves you very much and your obvious dislike of me is troubling her. It would be easier for everyone if you would meet me halfway."

"Halfway to what exactly? What are your plans? Do they include her? Finally?"

His brow creases and it's so much like Erica's expression of aggravation that I risk glancing down at her again and see that her own forehead mirrors his. She knows that we're trading something heavy up here. "I can't make up for lost time. I can't. And knowing the woman that she is now makes me regret all these years more than you will ever know. I don't have enough life left in me to offer to make it all up to her because I won't live that long. My plans for the future include her and I'd like very much for them to include you as well."

I don't pull away when he reaches out and takes my hand. He covers it with his, rubbing my fingers with his thumb. I glance down at Erica again and she's still watching us intently as George stitches up their patient. "If you hurt her -"

"If I hurt her ... I will readily surrender to the massive bone crushing you will deliver. I'm still properly chastened."

He's not smiling, despite the joking lilt in his voice.

I let my eyes move over his weathered, wrinkled face for a few moments before I speak. "When we were in Nebraska and she visited her adoptive parent's gravesite ... she fell apart. She said that she was a good kid and they only regarded her as a burden. They didn't want her. They didn't take care of her or provide for her. They let her exist, but they didn't let her live. They killed her every day.

"I don't know what that's like, Rick. I had a great family growing up. But I am trying to make up for lost time. I'm trying to love her and protect her enough to make up for what they did to her. You're in a position where you hold all the cards and you can destroy her the same way they did. So you'll have to forgive me if I don't like you very much. I think you're a reminder of what she COULD have had if you had been a man."

"A man like the one that you were roughhousing with in the hallway? Most people in a committed relationship wouldn't do that."

"I'm not most people."

"You're also not gay, according to Erica. Or, you weren't. You were married and had a long term boyfriend after that. I could look at you and say that YOU are holding all the cards and that YOU stand poised to hurt Erica more than I ever could."

"Don't talk to me about my personal life."

"Don't try to dig up dirt in mine."

Damn. "Touché."

"Never argue with a judge, Callie." His eyes crinkle around the edges when he smiles at me. "We're always right."

"Never argue with a Cuban. We are, too." I surrender the barest shadow of a smile. "I don't want to win this, though. I don't want to be right in worrying that you'll screw up."

"I can assure you ... Erica is in safe hands with me."

The hand he's referring to is still on mine and he squeezes it tenderly as he looks up at the monitor again to watch his daughter's finish the surgery.

I wish there was a litmus test for character.

Because I still look at him and want him gone.

I don't know what's wrong with me.

When Erica heads into the scrub room after her surgery, I lead Rick down the gallery stairs and into the hallway. I'm about to offer him a trip to the cafeteria to see if there's any coffee flavored mud left over when Jasper barrels through the stairwell door and causes it to slam against the wall. He's laughing riotously and the fake blood on his mouth is slick with spittle. He looks behind him and shrieks with glee when Gavin emerges from the stairwell looking winded. Jazz spots me, extends his arms, and runs toward me at breakneck speed while saying, "He's gonna get me!"

I brace myself because Jazz isn't slowing down, but when he crashes into me I still lose my balance. Actually, my balance is forsaken entirely and I go airborne. I slam into Rick, who collides with a cart and then drops backwards onto the floor. My own landing is incredible... in that teeth jarring, ground shaking way that knocks the breath out of your body. I feel like a rag doll as I crash to the ground and take stock of myself. Lungs? Empty. Hip? Throbbing. Wrist? Aching. Pride? Dead. What hurts the most is my knee and when I look down, I realize that I've gotten up close and personal with a prescription bottle. I reach for it at the same moment that Rick does and our hands touch. He snatches it from under my fingertips and stuffs it into the front of his jacket so quickly that it's like it was never there at all.

Jasper is on me in a flash, tugging at me, trying to pull me upright. My entire skeletal system feels like it has been misaligned as he wrestles me to my feet. "Sorry, Lee! I'm sorry!" he cries pitifully, wringing his hands. "I didn't mean to."

"Well, young man," Rick growls. He levels steel blue eyes at Jasper as he rises. "If you weren't running all over the hospital acting like a mongoloid this could have been avoided. Why are you dressed like a vampire when you're determined to behave like a retard?"

An out of body experience. That's what I'm having.

For the first time in my life ... I'm speechless.

I absolutely have nothing to say.

Words are impossible because my brain has turned to mush. So I stand there with my mouth slightly agape, my heart ajar, my nervous system shocked thoroughly ... and do nothing.

"I am not a retard," Jasper finally says. "Dirk fixed my head."

"Ask for a refund," Rick growls, smoothing his palms over his sleeves to work out the wrinkles.

So help me God ... his neck could break so easily. I know it would. I've never done it before, but I'm pretty sure that I'm furious enough to manage snapping it with sheer will power alone. If mental images could come to fruition ... I'm seeing his rib cage fly out of his chest and pummel him about the head. My mother used to say 'gobsmacked'. She would say that overwhelming events left her 'gobsmacked' and I've never fully appreciated that term until right now. Violent, angry words begin to take shape in my head and I open up my mouth to unleash the floodgates, but Jasper says, "Yellow! Hi, Yellow, hi!"

I hear Erica laugh and I don't have to turn around to know that he's launched himself at her, though more docilely now from the sounds of it. When she steps into the spot beside me, she's beaming and I have to look away.

"Did you enjoy the surgery, Dad?" she asks.

"It was incredible, honey." He reaches past me to hug her. "You're incredible."

They break apart and she's got an enormous smile on her face. Jasper puts his hands on his hips and cocks his head just so, clearly perplexed. "Who is he?" he demands of Gavin, who shrugs.

Erica looks at me. "You didn't introduce them? Dad, this is Callie's brother Jasper. Jazz, this is my dad."

I watch Rick's mouth drop open as realization dawns on him. It takes him several seconds to extend his hand toward Jazz, but Jasper Torres is having none of it. He stares down at Rick's hand like it's covered in shit. "I don't think so, Mister Dad! I don't like you."

"Jasper!" Erica scolds and it's her turn to look scandalized and her hands go to her hips now. "What in the world is -"

"Leave him alone," I cut her off, my eyes staying on my baby brother. He knows. Jazz know that he's different now. It's written all over his face. "He happens to be a good judge of character." To Rick, I add, "Fuck you, Judge."

"Yeah, fuck you, Pudge!" Jasper sticks his tongue out at him and turns around. To Gavin, he says, "I go back to my bed now."

I don't know what to do with myself and even if I did ... it's not possible to walk through the heavy tension around us.

Luckily I don't have to worry about it long.

Gavin reaches around Erica, grips my wrist, and pulls me through the tension. To his credit, he mumbles something about a consult.

To my credit, I refrain from reminding him I'm off duty.

I want to be far, far away from Rick Salinger.

Even though Addison thinks I'd flourish in jail, I don't.

My parents are gone for the night when I help Jazz into his pajamas. My brother is as silent a stone as I wash his face and hands. He takes the toothbrush from me and squeezes toothpaste onto it before I can. He puts half of the tube on the handle and the bristles, but I don't correct him. Instead, I sit down on the toilet and watch him work it back and forth and up and down in his mouth until he looks like a rabid dog and the sink is covered in foam. He rinses and pulls the long sleeve of his pajama shirt over his mouth instead of using the towel. Only when he sees the mess on his sleeve does he react. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Lee. I'm sorry."

Something in his voice chases away the murderous thoughts in my head and I stand up, realizing that he's shaking. I take the towel and mop up his sleeve, then I cup his face in both of my hands. "You don't have to be sorry. Ever. It's okay, buddy."

It's the first time I've ever noticed that we cry the same way. His chin is like mine when it starts to tremble. It wrinkles a little, his bottom lip quivers, and his nose gets bright red so fast that it looks like it has been pinched. Color floods his face as the first tears drop over his impossibly long eyelashes and they have a scalding effect on me when I brush them away. He catches my hand and holds it, squeezing it tight. "Where did I go, Lee? Why is my head broke?"

I wet a washcloth to buy myself some time. My parents haven't broached this topic with him. Whether it's because it hasn't come up or because they wanted to shelter him as much as possible ... I don't know. What I do know is that realization is never a pleasant feeling and the way he squirms as I bathe his face again makes me think that he's suffocating under the harsh reality of being broken. Most people have the capacity to understand their defects accordingly. Jasper is only grappling with it now. I weigh my options as carefully as possible, before saying, "You were in an accident. You fell into the water and drowned, Jasper. It damaged parts of your brain, but Derek is repairing those parts every day. You're going to be okay."

"I retard."

"You're not retarded."

"Stupid. I - I am stupid. I knock you down. I hurt you."

"I knocked you down one time when you broke my Walkman. We're all stupid. All the time."

He rubs his palm over his head, massaging the curved scar on his scalp with his fingers. He's gentle at first and then more insistent as he rakes his nails over the indentation. "I'm stupid. All the time."

I grab his hand, clinging to it. "No, that's not what I meant. You're not stupid, Jazzy. And you're not retarded. You're sick and that's why you're in the hospital. That's why they're helping you. You will be just fine. I promise."

His fingers are slick in mine because his palms are sweaty and I notice that there's moisture gathering at his hairline and on his upper lip. I adjust my grip on his hand and feel the pulse in his wrist. It's racing. I knew it would be. I wet the cloth again, this time with cold water, and rub it against his skin, then the back of his neck. He lets me do it for all of three seconds, then he slaps my hand away so hard that it jams my thumb, grabs the cloth, and throws it across the small bathroom. Before I can stop him, the shower curtain is wrenched from its rod and stomped thoroughly on the floor. "I HATE IT!" Jasper screams, reaching for the mirror. "I HATE ME!"

"JASPER! STOP!"

"Callie! Open the door!"

That's Gavin. I unlock the door at the precise moment that the mirror comes off the wall and shatters right over my head. I feel glass raining against me like a hail of bullets and duck, lifting my arms for cover until the only sound in the room is Jasper screeching and Gavin's sneakers squeaking against the tile as he wrestles with him.

Some things in life are like a bad sitcom. This? It's a horror movie. There's blood splashed against the walls from Jasper's hands and my sneaker hits a wet spot sending me sliding down in glass, which adds more blood to the picture. I don't register that I'm hurt because the pain in my leg is only a bee sting when I hear a choking, rasping sound and look up.

Jasper's face is white.

His eyes are rolled back in his head.

And he's thrashing like a fish out of water as Gavin pulls him past me.

Seizure, my brain screams. Seizure! Seizure!

I push myself up, ignoring the shards of mirror that collect in my palm as I do so, thankful that the physician I became is stronger than the sister that I want to always be.

Jasper has been thoroughly medicated and stabilized before I call my parents. This needed to be my private hell, I think. What it boils down to ... is that I pushed for this surgery. I wanted it. I craved it the way I craved Erica for so long. And part of me knew that the moment would come that Jasper would know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he was not like everyone else. It's fair that I'm the one who witnessed that mountain bury him and the aftershocks of the earthquake that came next. I brought this on all of us. I brought this on Jasper.

I leave blood smeared all over the phone as I hang up and when I turn around, Gavin is right behind me. There's a metal cart between us and he has laden it down with the tools he will need to extract the glass from my skin. Jasper and his bed have been wheeled to radiology so that a scan of his head can performed and Derek is en route to the hospital; I paged him myself. There's nothing left to do except wait and worry and wither. That's what I do. I wither away from reality for a few seconds, closing my eyes as I try to wrap my head around what has taken place.

I can't.

It's futile to try.

Gavin snaps his gloves in place and I'm sure he does it to draw me back to reality. "Are you okay, Callie?"

I shake my head, but I say, "Yeah, I'm fine."

"Don't lie to your superiors."

"Superior, my ass."

He grins at me and switches the lights on a little brighter, gesturing for my hands. I hold them both out, palms up, and he hisses. I say nothing as he fills a syringe with sterile fluid and flushes the blood off. "Hold still."

"Shouldn't I be sitting down for this?" I ask him.

"Only if you want the glass that's in your leg to go deeper."

I shift my weight from side to side and feel it now. My adrenalin rush had prevented me from realizing that there's something foreign in my body. Hell, right now ... I feel foreign in my body. "Oh."

"Yeah." He bends over my hands and sets to work, carefully extracting all the slivers and dropping them into a basin. "That thing with Erica's father ... that was messed up."

"I know."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Not really."

"I've always felt that people without souls are the only ones capable of saying things like that around people as innocent as your brother. If you change your mind and want to talk about it ... I'm around."

He doesn't look at me when he says it and I have to grit my teeth to keep from swearing as he flushes the cuts again, then presses to make sure he's got all the debris cleared. The wounds are superficial but what Gavin says about my brother is anything but. It dawns on me as he pulls yet another shard of glass out of my palm that Gavin may actually be human. Before I can wrap my head around that, he tells me that I won't need stitches and how disappointing that is. I'm smiling just a little when he bandages my palms with thick white gauze and secures it. "Thanks," I mutter, flexing my fingers around the uncomfortable binding. "It's overkill, but I'll live."

"Drop your pants."

"What?"

"I need to look at your leg."

"Shit."

"Please don't."

My scrubs are tattered when I pull my pants leg around to survey the damage. Instead of tugging them down, I hook one of the larger holes and tug, tearing the thin fabric easily. Gavin shakes his head, but he's grinning when he kneels down behind me and examines the cuts. "Yay," he finally says. "Do you want staples or stitches?"

"You're lying ... OW! God dammit!" I look behind me and he's holding up a jagged piece of the mirror. I can tell by the blood staining on one end that it was embedded pretty far into my leg. "Jesus! Warn somebody first!"

"It hurts less if you don't see it coming."

"THAT ONLY WORKS IN ORTHO, ELVIS!"

"You need about ten stitches."

"Fuck you! Use the Dermabond."

"It's too jagged. Dermabond won't hold it properly and you'll scar to high heaven."

"I hate you."

"Careful, Calliope. Your attitude directly reflects how generously I numb this before I start sewing."

"You're enjoying this far too much."

"You're right. I am. Now, hold still."

I can feel him cleaning the wound and try not to think about the fact that he's seeing a side of me that Simmons NEVER saw when he was the head of orthopedics. "Why were you chasing Jasper?"

"It's a game we play," Gavin tells me. "A few nights ago he came out into the hallway and asked me for something to drink. I got him a soda and he followed me around saying 'tag, you're it' until I finally turned around and chased him back down the hall. He's a good kid."

"He's not a kid. He's twenty five years old."

"And he's getting better. Everyone can see it. What one person CAN'T see doesn't diminish what IS. Don't forget that."

"I really can't believe -"

"What?"

"Erica's dad. I just met the man a couple days ago. Hell, Erica just met the man a couple of days ago. What kind of person says something like that?"

"Soulless ones. I already covered that."

"This sucks."

The door opens behind us and I glance over my shoulder at Erica. The flaring in her nostrils vanishes the second she takes in the situation. Her arms, which are crossed over her chest, flutter clumsily to her sides and her mouth goes slack when Gavin moves to one side and exposes my leg. "What happened!?"

"Hello, Dr. Hahn," Gavin greets, applying more pressure to my thigh. I can feel blood running down my leg and into my shoe now that he's pulled the mirror from me. "Could you please hand me the

lidocaine?"

"What happened!?" she demands again, ignoring the request entirely.

"Jasper had a seizure." I shift my weight uncomfortably as Gavin holds the compress against me. "After he had a tantrum."

"Jasper did this!? What -"

"Dr. Hahn!" Gavin barks, his voice loud and full of authority. "If you cannot assist me then please press the call button so that I can ask for a nurse."

Erica picks up the lidocaine injection and stalks forward. "Move. I've got this."

"No, ma'am, I think you're mistaken. I've got this."

I see the telltale warning signs of Erica's temper. Her mouth becomes a tight line, the dimple appears in the chin that she lifts defiantly in the air, and her blue eyes narrow just a little. It's the look a lion gets before it pounces on the wildebeest and rips the jugular out with one bite. "Excuse me -"

"No, excuse me," Gavin interrupts, holding out his hand for the shot. "Perhaps you can throw your weight around in your operating room and perhaps you believe the hype that surrounds your specialty and think that you're somehow superior to me, but I don't. And as I've already stated, I've got this under control. If you want to remain and assist me, silently I might add, then have at it. But I'll have to ask you to leave if you hinder me in treating her. Now, give me the lidocaine and let me repair the damage."

She thinks about ramming it in his eye. I can tell. And I hold my breath until the medication is surrendered to him because I know Erica. She's scary. Before I can contemplate any commentary on Jasper or my current predicament, Gavin begins injecting me with liquid venom and it burns enough to evaporate conscious thought processing for me. I happily turn back to the wall and rest my head against it. When I lean back, I feel something wet there, and move one of my unbandaged fingers to the back of my scalp. Yep, bleeding there too. It shouldn't surprise me that I am, Jasper did hit the wall right over my head with a mirror, but the discovery of the blood there shocks me as much as Jasper's outburst did. My first instinct is to ignore the blood and let the gash there be my punishment for Jasper's seizure, but Erica sees my finger and moves me away from the wall.

She looks at the gash on the back of my head and before I know it, she's put on gloves and has a pair of tweezers in her hand. She removes a single shard of glass from my skin and gazes down at it, then looks at me. "You couldn't know this would happen, Callie." And just like that, Erica has read my every thought and fear, and she's taken some of the pain out of the situation.

"He was, god ... Erica, he was scary."

"Everyone is," she replies softly, holding a ball of gauze against the back of my head. "It's okay."

Relationships are hard. It's not just romantic entanglements that can drive you crazy. My mother has been driving me insane for months while she vacillates over whether or not she can accept Erica's place in my life. And what Rick said in the gallery is right. Erica has gone out of her way to accommodate my mother and all of her mood swings. Erica has pushed me to understand where my mother is coming from and encouraged me to meet her halfway. Hell, at one point she lifted my hand and put it in my mother's and I can't forget that. Even while I contemplate the many ways I could repay Rick for what he said to Jazz ... the fact that he's her father is at the forefront of my mind. And that is the most complicated thing I've experienced in a long time.

Erica finally moves beside me, rubbing a hand over my back. "What happened before the seizure?"

"He was tachycardic and presented with -"

"No, Callie," Erica cuts me off. "What happened in the hallway with Dad?"

I grit my teeth against the burn as Gavin moves the needle into another tender spot and dispenses more acid under my skin. "This really isn't the best time to -"

"Just tell me."

"We'll talk about it later."

"Did he say something to you in the gallery? You looked upset."

"We said a lot of stuff. OW! God! You're doing that on purpose, Elvis!"

"Yes, because I invented lidocaine," he replies. "Stop moving around."

"Hurry up!" I never expected that this would be the end to my day. My mind wanders back six years, to the moment that Colby Bernson walked into my life with his bone cancer and desire to trick or treat. Jasper got to trick or treat one last time. If he dies ... at least he -

"Am I sending Dad to the Archfield or not?" Erica demands suddenly. "Help me out here, Callie!"

"Send him to Siberia," Gavin suggests, readying the suturing kit. "I'll pay the airfare."

Erica looks down at him briefly and then glares at me. "You'll talk to him, but not me."

"She didn't have to talk to me. I was there for it. You're gonna feel some pressure, Cal," Gavin says, pulling my flesh together as he sets to work. "Trust me, Dr. Hahn, the Archfield is too nice for him."

"Mind your own damn business," Erica demands. She takes a deep breath and pushes my hair over my shoulder so she can see me better. "What do you want me to do?"

What I want her to do could get me sent to prison for even suggesting it, so I shake my head in an attempt to clear it. "I don't know, Erica. Jasper ... this - this could be a huge setback for him. This could be fatal. Under the circumstances, I don't care where your father sleeps tonight."

The doors open again and my parents arrive. They're both still in their pajamas and I can't remember what I must have said to bring them here this way. Apparently it was succinct enough to lure them without preamble on their parts. It's mayhem for the next five minutes as I try to explain to my family that Jasper is now very, very aware that he's different. When my leg is bandaged and my mental state is close to certifiable, Derek shows up and asks us to follow him to the family room.

The janitorial department has arrived in full force to clean up the wreckage and I'm sure they get an eyeful when I walk past them. There's definitely a draft in the back of my pants, but I really don't care. Erica has the presence of mind to pick up a hospital gown and open it, urging me to slip it on to preserve my modesty and I oblige as we walk down the hall. She gently cradles my hand in hers and I notice that Rick is sitting in the waiting room as we head past it. He looks up, but doesn't rise.

Maybe Erica shot him down.

I don't know.

I'm trying to force myself to think of anything other than what Derek COULD say at this point.

You're really only led to the family room for the most dire situations and I hold my breath as we all file in ... like pigs going to slaughter.

Derek can take us all out with one bullet.

I hope he's merciful ... whatever he needs to tell us.


	38. Chapter 38

When Jasper was twenty five and I was thirty five, he had surgery to repair the damage in his brain.

There are some things that a person never forgets. I will never forget the way he smells when he's fresh from the ocean and the sun has warmed his skin. I will never forget the sound of his voice when it's heavy with sleep or the loud contrast when he's bellowing a greeting to a random stranger. The way his fingers stain orange from Cheetos, the way he rubs his head absently when he's trying to say something, the way he rose to his knees on the stretcher to wave goodbye as they led him to surgery. Those are the immediate things I remember, but as I follow Derek down the hallway toward a conclusion that I'd prefer to skip, I remember Jasper as a baby. He had rolls and rolls of fat and dimpled cheeks that were usually rosy with life. He never cried. He rarely screamed like other babies as he waited for a bottle and he'd kick his chubby feet to get our attention if we walked past him in his bouncing seat.

What I'm really concentrating on ... is the fact that Jasper was always so happy go lucky. There were moments in his childhood that were highlighted by a sour attitude or an angry outburst, but even before he was damaged ... Jasper was inherently good, almost angelic to a fault. I don't want his last realization to be that he's *wrong*, that's he's different, that he isn't like everyone else. No one should know that they have shortcomings beyond their control because the truth of it is ... every flawed human being has the ability to correct what taints them. If you're crass, you can tone it down. If you're rude, you can think before you speak. If you're prone to violent outbursts you can get help. Jasper can't do that. The mongoloid, as Rick so deviously called him, is incapable of changing himself on his own.

And the 'mongoloid' knows that he's 'retarded'. He's not whole.

That news hit him with the force of Thor's hammer and he could be dead or dying ... and the last cognizant thought he had is that he hates himself.

For being himself.

I'm rapidly beginning to realize that Erica Hahn is never wrong. She fought me tooth and nail about this surgery. She saw past his wrongness, past his brain damage, and was able to accept him for who he is, not who he could be. The woman who was able to wedge herself into my gut never saw him as anything less than a man and she tried to tell me. She tried to show me and make me see the error of my ways, but I refused. I don't know how someone who grew up with nothing can value everything so much, but she does. There is something incessantly valuable about love and loving Jasper the way he was at ten when he went into the ocean should never have been greater than the love I had for him after ten ... but ... God ... if I loved him just as much why would I have done this to him?

Jasper changed, but so did I.

Rick vocalized what I've obviously been thinking for fifteen years.

I just didn't say it out loud. Instead of finding the courage to speak it, I proved that it was in my heart by doing anything I could to change him.

'God, give me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change.'

I get it now.

Acceptance isn't giving in, it's going on. It's making do with what you have instead of pushing through life and death for what you think you're supposed to have.

My inability to accept Jasper for the man he became was only ever my issue. Not his.

He could be hemorrhaging in his head right now because of me.

If he's bleeding out as much as I am bleeding IN then he's probably already dead. If my pain could be tapped, it would not run from me in a steady crimson river, it would blow like a geyser and cover everything around me in my shame. Whether or not I did it for the right reasons doesn't eclipse the fact that I did. The wounds on my hands, the jagged, throbbing cut on my leg, the stinging cut in my scalp ... there only reminders that I'm here and I'm culpable.

There will be no expiation for me.

Regardless of what Derek says.

"Callie?"

I blink and glance toward Erica, but I don't see her. She's right in front of me and the only thing I can concentrate on are the light panels that make up three sides of the radiology department. We're not in the family room. I clock so many hours in this room looking at films that I should feel at home, but I don't. I can't. Not right now.

"I took the liberty of running a few X-rays to go along with the MRI," Derek says, flipping the light switch on the largest wall. "This ... is Jasper's scan before the surgery."

He points out key points on Jasper's sad looking hippocampus, underused and unresponsive in so many ways. I recognize the shape of my baby brother's nose and clench my hands into fists which is really the wrong thing to do. It hurts. The glass was as unkind to me as I've been to Jasper. I feel Erica's arm slide around my shoulders and I instinctively lean my head against hers for comfort, to breathe her in over the sterile finality of a fucking hospital. She presses her lips against my temple and stays that way as Derek takes a deep breath. She's not looking at the scan. I don't want to be looking either.

"And this is his film from a little while ago."

'God, grant me the wisdom to know the difference.'

He does.

It's undeniable and now I do hiss. It's a gasping, wheezing intake of breath and I pull away from Erica and step forward, unwilling to believe my eyes. I can make out the transmitters that were carefully placed inside Jasper's cranium. I can see the evidence of the stroke he had not longer after that. And his nose still looks the exact same, but it's a different brain. I has to be a different brain. The sound of fingers flying over a keyboard pulls me from my reverie and I turn around to look at the computer monitor that holds the results of the MRI.

It's all there.

It's clear.

"What does this mean?" Mom cuts through my thoughts and when I focus on her, she's frantically looking from the light panel to the computer screen.

"Callie?" Derek gives me his patented smile and the air rushes from me like I'm about to swoon. It has nothing to do with Dr. McDreamy and everything to do with my brother.

"It means," I say, stunned that my voice is there at all, "that Jasper is recovering. The stimulation is working and ... he's coming back."

Dad covers his face with his hands and makes a sound like a siren wailing for a split second, then he silently shakes as relief charges through him. Erica moves forward, hugging him, and he wraps both arms around her. She's a little taller than him and I watch him put his forehead against her shoulder as she pats his back. Mom and I are the resolute ones and we exchange evenly cautious looks before turning our attention to Derek. "What about the seizure?" Mom queries.

Sitting casually on the edge of the desk, Derek gives her his full attention. "I'd like to say that it's an isolated event, but I can't guarantee that. This could be his body's way of rebelling against the intrusion in his head. Or ... it could have been the first in a series. What matters the most is the fact that we were able to immediately control the seizure with medication and can give him preventative drugs to ward off anything else. And, Mrs. Torres, he's got a real chance of making a recovery in the ninetieth percentile of what we've seen previously in this clinical trial. That's outstanding."

"Lee?"

I look toward the doorway where Izzie and Jasper are standing side by side. She's wearing a pair of pajama bottoms under a thick coat and I wonder who summoned her to the hospital. I wonder if she came for him or for something else, but I don't dwell on it. I can't dwell on it. Jasper is standing there in fresh slipper socks with his hospital gown flapping around his bare legs as he worries the bandages on his own hands. They're just like mine. "I didn't mean it. I'm sorry. I'm real sorry, Lee. You okay?"

The brain releases chemicals for a myriad of reasons: serotonin, dopamine, endorphins. I feel like my brain unleashes every one and the sensation of drowning, of floating, of flying, of dancing through a raging fire ... rushes through me as I meet him halfway. In the middle of the radiology department, with only the lights from the back panel to illuminate us, I wrap my arms around Jasper and he hangs on so tight that it's painful. But adrenaline makes me immune. Love makes me immobile. And relief is kind to me as he mumbles in my ear that he loves me and chases away the tension in my body.

He shouldn't be out of bed yet.

But I'm not letting him go.

*~*~*~*~

It's almost midnight when we head for home. Erica holds my hand in the car and keeps casting furtive glances into the rearview mirror where her father solemnly imitates a statue and remains mum. I don't care that he's there. I could not care less that he's breathing my air or imposing on my hospitality because Jasper's going to be okay. He is. I think maybe I can believe that now. As I watch Halloween slide past on the glowing green dashboard clock and November First arrive, I consider how much we can torment ourselves. I was convinced just a few hours ago that Jasper's surgery made me a criminal, but my family ... even Derek ... acted like I was the second coming for pushing as hard as I could to get the approval.

Jasper didn't thank me. When we returned to his room, he climbed into the bed, pulled the cover up to his waist, and stared at the ceiling. He didn't want anything to drink, refused green Jell-O and shook his head when I offered him a Popsicle. His eyes closed when I kissed him goodnight and they stayed that way, even when I looked back from the doorway. Both of my parents are spending the night with him and part of me wanted to stay as well, but mental and physical exhaustion made my spirit cry for home and that's where I find myself lost in my thoughts.

I make it as far as the sofa as Erica goes into the kitchen and returns with a bottle of water. She also holds out a large pink pill that I recognize as Darvocet. Looking up at her, I raise a brow. "I thought you drug proofed the house."

"You're the most accident prone person alive, Lee," she replies, winking at me. "Would I really do that?"

"Where are -"

"If you go looking for them I'll break your arm. I mean it."

"Yes, ma'am," I reply, trying to look scared. Taking the pill, I wash it down with water as I listen to Rick creep around upstairs. He made a beeline for the guest bedroom the second we got home.

She leans down and kisses me, then sits on the coffee table across from me, her knees between mine. "You ready for bed?"

I shake my head. "Not yet. I - I think I need to ... process."

Rubbing my leg, she nods. "I'm going to go take a shower. Do you need anything?"

"I'm fine."

Her gaze moves toward the ceiling when Rick steps on a squeaky floorboard. "Maybe you should come with me."

"I'll be okay."

"What did he say to you? At the hospital?"

"Erica ..."

"I have a right to know."

"I'm really happy right now. I'm REALLY happy right now. I don't want to talk about that yet. Just let me ... bask."

When she inhales with defeat, her breath is shaky. She knows that something huge happened. And she also knows that what transpired has the potential of shattering her illusions of her father and that, more than my need to relish the glory of success, makes her give in. Her own sense of self preservation kicks in. She gives me another kiss as she rises and tells me not to stay up much longer. I assure her that I'll be in the bed before the pill renders me unconscious and she relents. She does pause and look back at me before she goes up the stairs and I give her a smile, letting her know that I was enjoying the view.

The pipes clang with authority five minutes later and I lick my lips as I imagine what she's doing right now. She always lets the water run while she brushes her teeth and combs through her hair to remove any tangles. I picture her in my mind's eye, sliding off her pants, tugging her sweater off. And it's tempting. Oh, how much I hate the cuts on me and the fact that I'll be out of the water for at least twenty four hours because of them. I want to touch her. I want to celebrate with my body so that my pulse can race my mind. Instead, I sit here with my thoughts and lose myself for a while.

I don't even notice that Rick has come downstairs until his cologne tickles my nose and the sofa shifts beside me. "Callie, I know that -"

"No, you don't know."

His hair is stark, solid white and standing up on one side. I imagine he's been dragging his hands through it in frustration. Or maybe in sorrow. I don't know. I don't want to know. I watch him extend his hand toward me and when he opens it, the prescription bottle that I landed on in the hallway is in his palm. I know it's the same one because it's misshapen, dented a little. "Look at it," he tells me, holding it a little closer to me.

I take it because it's practically under my nose and turn it around so I can read it. What I see makes my heart, something I would have sworn was immune to him, crack just a little. If you press a needle into an inflated balloon just so it will slowly lose its air. That's what happens to me. I don't explode with the severity of the situation, but I feel a sharp prick in my gut that makes me wilt enough that *I* can see the difference in myself. My shoulders slump, my throat constricts, I toe the line between anger and sorrow, but sorrow wins. "When did you find out?"

He clears his throat. "A few months ago. I started misplacing my keys and couldn't remember where I had left them. I left the stove on a few times and set off the fire alarm. I'd forget my phone number or where the grocery store was and I tried to dismiss it. Then I forgot the twins at the playground. I literally took them there and an hour later I wandered away trying to remember where I was. They say it's the early stages. If this is what the onset of Alzheimer's feels like then I dread the full blown affliction. I'm scared.

"I'm also very sorry for what I said to your brother. Looking at him felt like looking into a mirror and seeing what I'm destined to become. The only difference is ... he still has his youth. And I'll be an old man trapped in his head wondering how I got there."

"Does Erica know?"

"None of my children know, Callie. Except you." He pauses for a second and I'm tempted to reach out to him, to take his hand, but I don't. And he seems to understand my reticence because he plows ahead, seemingly undaunted, despite the fact that I didn't acknowledge that I'm his *child*, too. "I know that what I did to Erica and her mother was wrong. I have lived with it everyday for over forty years and I wasted every second of it wallowing in my own pain instead of repairing theirs. The time that I have left to get to know Erica, to assure her that I never once let her slip my mind, to introduce her to her siblings ... that's what I'm living for right now. And if you would let me do that ... it would be a lot easier to accept that I'm going to forget her eventually ... I'm going to forget everyone. This is my punishment for my transgressions and I accept it. Please accept me. You won't have to do it long."

I look back down at the bottle in my hand. Exelon. He's telling the truth about the disease that will inevitably consume him. When Jasper was ten and I was twenty, he had an *accident*. Rick's accident is coming a little at a time, but the result will be the same. Only ... it's inoperable. "Are you going to tell her?"

"It's my fervent wish that she not find out about this or what I said to Jasper. I'm not asking you to lie to her, but I'm asking you to omit this. It will change everything and I'm only just beginning to scratch the surface of what I'd like to have with her." He reaches out and plucks the bottle from my hand, stowing it in the pocket of his robe. "I'd never advocate keeping secrets from your loved ones. Lord knows, I experienced all the examples of why. What I said to your brother assassinated my own character, but I am not ready to be buried yet. Please. Please don't take this from me."

I hear our bedroom door open and Erica emerges. She draws up short at the top of the stairs and looks down at us with apprehension marring her features. When she descends a second later, I can practically see her moving on eggshells. It feels more like she's moving on me in a pair of sharp ice skates. You give your lover all the power in your life. You trust them with your body in its most intimate moments, you believe that they will aid you toward release and give you license with their own body. You can be shattered with a cross word or a look in the blink of an eye and always ... always ... always ... you hold them in the palm of your hand above boiling water. If you drop them, they're burned.

The smile that lights my face is hers alone, that phantom tugging that can wipe the angst off my face and surrender to the happiness that she alone brings. And it's genuine, despite the crushing longevity of the truth. I clear my throat and say, "I'm definitely sleepy now, Yellow. That pill -"

"I want to know, " she says, cutting me off. Her hands go to her hips, where her blue robe flares slightly. "I've had it. You've both exhausted my patience and I don't care if you're making nice now. Tell me what happened! I mean it!"

"I-" Rick begins.

His hand feels like leather when I cover it with my own. "I overreacted," I say calmly. "I could smell alcohol on his breath in the gallery when we were watching you operate. And I reminded him of what your parents put you through." I look over at him and his blue eyes are sparkling the ways hers always do. "So he reminded me that he's going to fix that. Everything's fine."

With his free hand, he brushes my hair aside and kisses my forehead. I don't have the urge to recoil now. I can't. "I'm very sorry. To both of you. It won't happen again."

I know that you strike a match next to a container of gasoline every time you lie to someone who loves you, but I still do it to give her this respite. I see a plethora of emotions play over her face in the span of time that it takes for her to register what I've said and then her chin trembles just a little, almost imperceptibly. It is reminiscent of the time she told me she didn't make friends easily as we stood at the scrub sinks. And it's the glimmer of pain I see in that quivering that makes me not regret lying to her.

Yet.

She would do more than teeter on the edge of hysteria if I told her the full scope of the situation.

It's better to assuage her than assault her.

*~*~*~

Chief Webber has a perverse sense of what constitutes 'light duty'. I show up for the work bright and early the following morning and he looks shocked to see me. In that moment, I realize what a toll my life has had on my job in the past year and a half. I got married, divorced, promoted, demoted, broke Mark, broke myself, had surgery, and then got engaged to someone of the same sex. It's no wonder he does a double take when I assure him that I'm ready to work my full shift and summarily dismisses the notion. He assures me that I will be better suited for a half day and tells me that I'm not getting near a scalpel with my hands the way they are. Instead, he gives me a pen and a stack of charts which is akin to dwelling in the twentieth dimension of Hell. I'm drawing sunflowers in the margin when Addison plops down beside me.

"I heard what happened with Jasper. You shouldn't be here. Are you okay?"

"I'm good. How are you?"

"Morning sickness can kiss my ass."

"That bad, huh?" I glance at her and grimace. "You're green. Why are you green?"

"I smelled sausage in the cafeteria which made me think of those little hard things you bite down on and ..."

I wrinkle my nose when she grabs the garbage can and heaves into it. This is what I look forward to the *least* about having a kid one day. If I'm anything like my mother, I'll lose a ton of weight in the beginning from barfing and then gain a ton at the end from eating everything that isn't nailed down. "You okay?"

"Children should be grown on the *outside* of the body, Cal." She wipes her mouth with tissue and leans back, clutching her belly. "If this brat breaks curfew, backtalks, acts Emo or attempts to listen to Miley Cyrus ... all bets are off."

I chuckle, drawing a stem on the flower. "In other words, you want to push an adult out of your vagina. Think long and hard about that, Addison. You're pretty tall."

She snarls, crossing her arms over her chest. "Fine. Babies aren't that bad."

"Mark certainly seems to agree. He was taking excellent care of the little Eeyore last night at the party."

"Until it pooped. And then he handed it off to the nearest taker."

"He's a work in progress."

Addison shakes her head. "No. I think maybe he's the finished product."

"Oh yea? Is he a da Vinci or a kindergarten finger paint."

"Definitely da Vinci. But he does nice things with his fingers."

I pretend to heave. "Didn't really need to know that, but thanks for sharing."

She grins. "We're moving in together. Officially."

"Really?"

"He'll close on the house in a few days. We've been shopping for stuff and squirreling it away."

"Well, stop that because I'll throw you guys a housewarming party."

When Addison Montgomery beams at you, it's kinda breathtaking. "Yay! You got my hint before I had to embarrass myself by asking you to."

"Well, I've pretty much got this friendship thing down pat now."

"I've noticed."

It's really amazing how much two words can touch you. I look at her for a few seconds, then back down at my chart. What do you say in response to that? "Webber's got me doing paperwork. Do you want to buy me a coffee to thank me for the fucking invitations I'll have to address by hand? And the people I'll have to pretend to like in order to get you some loot?"

"I'd buy you steak and eggs, Torres, but the sight of it would make me hock up a lung. So ... coffee it is."

I leave my partially completed work without a second glance or any guilt because really, not even interns should be charting. It's mind numbing and my mind is already incapable of much more than breathing. Erica is off again today, but she more than made up for that this morning before I left. Waking up with someone tracing certain areas with their tongue? Great start to the day. I'm just saying. But then Jasper dampened my mood considerably. He refused to eat breakfast with me, even though I stopped and bought him his favorite from Burger King. I couldn't even entice him with hash rounds. He simply rolled over and went to sleep. I think. It's possible he was faking. My parents said that he was withdrawn and sullen the entire night. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried. I am. Very much.

"What's on your mind?" Addison asks, looping her arm through mine as we make our way to the cafeteria. "And don't make me drag it out of you. I'm weak. And coffee free. Which means that I get to sit and watch *you* have coffee while I suffer."

"Get a decaf."

"Mark will still kill me. He has a built in radar when it comes to *anything* that could be bad for the baby." She presses the elevator button, arm still through mine. "You know, not to rain on our parade or anything, but he's actively denying that this baby may not be his."

"I know." I watch her worry her bottom lip between her teeth. "But you could also say that he's actively hoping that it is and that hope is keeping him sane."

"Erica's been good for you, Miss Diplomat. All this talk of hope. I named that fucking dog 'Hope' for you and she chewed up my favorite Louboutin heels. I should have named her 'Hate'."

"She's a puppy. She'll grow out of it."

"Yes, she'll grow *bigger* and start eating my purses."

The elevator pings and we board, exchanging wary looks as the doors slide shut. I glance up at the floors. "This is the *same* fucking elevator we almost died in. Look at what you've done to me, Addison! I told you I'd never ride this one with you again."

She reaches down and grips the handicap rail. Who puts a handicap rail in a freight elevator. "Don't talk like that. I feel nauseated because of the motion as it is."

"Puke on my new sneakers and you're dead."

With a nasty look at my shoes, she says, "They'd look better if I did. They're ugly."

"Bite me."

The elevator bounces to a stop and Addison bends over, vomiting up whatever is left of her breakfast.

Mark is on the other side of the door when it opens and he springs into actions before I can do little more than sidestep out of his way. I hold the door open as he leads her to a nearby chair and kneels in front of her. As he speaks to her in a low, soothing voice ... I find myself picturing their baby in my head. Red hair, I think. Bright, cerulean eyes. Dimples. Thin little lips and unfortunate ears because they both were over blessed in that regard.

I know it's pushing it because I've already been given so much ... but I send up a prayer for the baby to have Mark's DNA.

Because I think he's earned that.

*~*~*~

"Jasper."

"Leave me alone."

"You need to eat something, buddy."

"I'm not a buddy."

"You're my buddy. You always have been and you always will be."

"I'm bad."

I grip his chin and force him to look at me. "No, you're not."

He reaches up like he wants to push my hand away, but he stops himself at the last minute. This is a side of him that I really don't know how to handle. When I first came into the room ... he yelled at me to leave. I refused so he threw a pillow at me and then climbed out of the bed and apologized profusely, kissing my cheek a million times. He looks at me now, almond shaped eyes filled with moisture. "I swim?"

"You can't right now. I know you want to, but you can't."

Flopping onto his back, he stares up at the ceiling. "Hate it here."

I fumble with the side rail, trying to let it down, but he shakes his head and holds it firm, wrapping his hand around it to keep it in place. He doesn't want me getting any closer to him and that's scary. I don't know if he's mad at me for the right reasons or the wrong. I catch my father's eye and he nods at the door. We leave my mother standing at the foot of Jasper's bed watching him and close the door behind us, leaving her alone with him. "Something's wrong with him, Dad."

"I know."

"When I was researching the Fellman-Caputo, there was a lot of discourse about patients becoming withdrawn and angry. I mean, of course he's angry. He's lost fifteen years of his life and he can't get that back. But -"

"Derek stopped in earlier."

Something in his tone makes my stomach flip a few times. "And?"

From the breast pocket of his jacket, Dad pulls out a folded piece of paper and gives it to me. I open it, stunned at how steady my hands are, but that's short lived. I only make it through a few lines before I realize what's happening. Dad clears his throat and says, "He wants to keep him in or around Seattle so that he can remain his surgeon, Callie."

"Derek want him institutionalized!?"

"Jasper needs therapy, Callie. He needs someone to help him wade through these new waters and we're not equipped to do that. He can't stay here at Seattle Grace indefinitely, honey, and you can't take him home with you. With the hours that you keep here at the hospital ... he'd be left alone all the time."

"You and Mom -"

"He had another outburst earlier. He knocked your mother down and I'm too old to fight with him." Dad takes a step forward and wraps me in a tight hug. "It's not forever. It's just until he reaches a plateau. We can't handle him like this. We can't."

"Dad!" I gasp, starting to get light headed and dizzy from the blood rushing to my head. "That's giving up on him! He's part of our family! We can't just send him off somewhere! He'd die! He needs us! He needs *you*!"

"Hey! I am not giving up on him!" Dad snaps, his voice deeper than usual. "I have to do what's best for him! We agreed to this surgery! It was scary and hard to do, but we did it! Now we have to agree to let him heal and we can't do that for him! YOU can't do that for him!"

"I can damn well TRY!"

"It's decided, Calliope! Now look over that list of centers and help us figure out which one is the best for him!"

"NO!" I wad the paper into a tight ball and, fully embracing my tantrum, throw it at him.

I start to cry before I make it to the stairwell and nearly trip as I hastily pull my phone from my pocket. There's only one voice I want to hear right now, only one person who can help me. Erica answers on the second ring, "Hey, baby! How's your day going?"

It's hard to get the words out. It's nearly impossible to push them past the vise that has gripped my throat. "They want to have him committed! They're sending him away!"

"What?"

"My parents are putting Jasper in a *home*, Erica!" I cry. "They're going to kill him!"

"Whoa! Slow down! Breathe!"

I oblige, taking a deep breath as I rush down another flight of stairs. "They can't do this!"

"Calm down before you make yourself sick. What are you doing? It sounds like you're running."

"I'm going to the basement so I can punch something! I can't believe they'd do this! Bring him back just to throw him away! That's so fucked up!"

"I'm a Joe's with my dad. I'm coming."

I hit the spot in the hospital where no cell phones work and the call disconnects. I cut across the lobby, still sobbing, and then march through the service hallway, interrupting several resident's lunch. I don't register faces or *care* that they're seeing me fall apart. My sneakers squeak on the tile as I yank open the door to the basement and rush to the area that I called home for so long. There's a laundry cart there, oversized and filled with sheets, so I grab it and toss it against the wall. I upend a model skeleton, sending it flying. Next, I attack a broken portable IV and it sails across the room like a javelin.

I reach for a box of files, intent on ripping everything to shreds, but a hand covers mine before I can lift the lid. I see a shock of blond hair through my tears and for a moment ... I think that it's Erica, but then Izzie Stevens speaks. "Callie, please stop ... your hands are bleeding. Did something happen to Jasper?"

I draw my arm over my eyes, clearing away the moisture. "He's *changed*."

"I know."

"And my parents can't control him. They'd rather send him somewhere. An institution."

Her bottom jaw drops open. "What!? Oh my god!"

"So," I choke out, sobbing anew. "I fought to bring him back just so they could give him away."

"No, no, don't think like that!"

When she steps forward and hugs me ... it's like a good dousing from a water hose. A portion of the fire raging in my veins is considerably extinguished, replaced instead with my skin crawling. This is *Izzie Stevens*. Hugging me. I'm torn by whether to shove her away or hit her in the gut. I shock myself by settling on standing there, letting her squeeze me reassuringly while she murmurs that she's sorry, that she'll try to help me. I teeter on the brink of violence for a good sixty seconds and then she lets me go and gives me a sheepish look. "I'm sorry," she say, straightening her shirt. "I - I just - I wish that - well -"

"If you're attached to your arms, Stevens, don't put them on me again."

"Sorry. I was trying to make you stop destroying the basement."

"By filling me with the urge to destroy you?"

"Ouch."

I can't help it. I laugh. I actually laugh and it takes me a second to realize that her own laughter has joined mine. I'm certifiable. I should be the one sent to an institution because here I am, with my sworn enemy, standing in the middle of dirty sheets that I tossed all over the place ... and she *hugged* me. And lived.

I've lost my mojo.

I lean back against the wall after a while, lifting my foot and bracing it against it. She gingerly sits down on the box of files that I wanted to shred and says, "So ... he's getting better. I - I know that I'm not involved in the case. I'm technically not even back at work yet, but I looked at his chart. And his scans."

"Oh really?"

"I'm sorry for interfering." Her hair is shorter now, barely skimming her shoulders.

I wonder if she cut it so severely to remove the memory of Alex's fingers in it, but I don't ask. Instead, I study her face for any sign of deception. The only thing present on her features is a look of compassion. Interest. Concern. I want to kick her. "Why?"

"Why am I sorry?"

"Why are you interested?"

She crosses her arms over her chest and then thinks better of looking defensive. She opts for lacing her fingers together in her lap instead. "How could I not be interested?"

"You're intrigued by the medical aspect of it?"

"No, I'm intrigued by Jazz and his ability to say and do everything that matters."

I nod at her. "He does tend to do that."

"I probably would have died if he had not been around after ... everything that happened. I know that you and I are not friends, but he is. My friend. I don't want to ever see him hurt."

"And maybe you think you can somehow make amends for all that you did to me by helping my brother?"

She doesn't blink. "It's not about you, but if it helps you see me as something other than a bitch ... I won't complain."

I feel my jaw tighten just a little. "At least you've finally figured out how to weave honesty into your life."

"Jasper *changed* my life. And I will help him any way that I can. I'll help ... you."

"Well, you helped me not vandalize the hospital so I guess we're off to a decent start."

She gives me a half smile that makes her seem less like the barracuda I've always seen her as and more like a human being.

I want to gouge my eyes out.

Hating her felt pretty fucking good.

I hear a door open behind a rack of supplies and footsteps clattering across the cement floor. Erica appears a second later, her umbrella in one hand, and draws up short when she sees the two of us amidst the mess I created.

Izzie hops down from her perch. "Cavalry."

"Yeah." I grin the way that only a person who has someone like Erica Hahn in their life can grin. With her on my team, who in the hell would go against me?

"Cavalry."

Five minutes later ... I want to scream.

And not in ecstasy.

We're still in the basement, Erica has taken Izzie's seat, and the way she casually swings her legs back and forth after what she JUST said to me is pissing me off. I pace back and forth, punctuating each step with four letter words that would curl the toes of the most prolific linguists. Her umbrella is leaning against the stack of boxes she's sitting on, dried now, and I kick it across the room. "FUCK!"

"Callie-"

"YOU DON'T GET TO AGREE WITH THEM!"

"Yes, actually I do."

"God damnit, Erica!"

"Hey, I pulled glass out of your head last night. I watched Gavin *Cole* stitch your ass up and had to deal with his attitude on top of that." She stops swinging her legs and reaches out, tugging my arm. I let her pull me forward and she touches the frown line on my forehead. Her calm exterior is jarring my frayed one. "What you didn't plan for when you pushed for this surgery ... was this. You expected Jazz to come back instantly, baby, because he was *instantly* taken away from you, but that's not how it works."

The tightness in my chest is painful now. "Sending him away from us -"

"You're not sending him away. You're bringing him home ... you just ... have to let him go a little while before you can." She catches one of my tears with her thumb. "I know this hurts you, but you'll be hurting *him* if you don't let him get all the help he can possibly get. We can't do it for him. YOU can't do it for him. And your parents are certainly not in a position to help him out. I mean, your mother coddles him. She babies him. She doesn't expect him to do anything on his own and the only way he will learn that he CAN is with the freedom to do that."

"You know what those places are like. You *know*."

She suddenly gets a frown line that matches mine. Her bottom jaw drops open just a little and she presses her fingers to her lips as she gazes past me. I actually turn to see if something or someone is there, but it's still just the two of us.

"Erica?"

"Oh my god."

"What?"

"Rachel's clinic," she says softly. "I - why didn't I think of this sooner? Jim is a licensed rehabilitator. The clinic has round the clock psychologists and acute care for anything that could go wrong and it's ... it's thirty minutes from the house. Derek could go out there and see him anytime he wanted to. The nurses could bring him here for his checkups. I mean, you've seen the people there, Callie, they're happy. And the staff is extraordinary."

My mind flashes to Geneva, sitting next to me at the piano as I played song after song during the party that Erica took me to. I remember the way she resolutely played her fake piano on the dinner table, unable to stop her mind from working through the notes even though her hands had been rendered incapable of actually doing so. I can hear all of their voices, those men and women who welcomed me as a family member, like distant thunder rolling through the fog in my head.

They didn't care that they were different.

Could they teach Jasper the same thing?

"Come here." Erica pulls me into her arms and I stand between her legs, my shaking hands restlessly lying on her shoulders. She tilts my chin until she can look me in the face. "This is a lot to take in. You've had a very rude awakening today and it's understandable that you'd have this reaction."

"I know, but -"

"Listen to me." She shakes her head just a little. "Look at the mess you made down here."

I glance behind us, taking in the sheets that I upended, the broken laundry cart, and all the rest. "I see it."

"And you know how to process it. You know *why* you felt the need to do it. Jasper doesn't know that right now, Lee. He did the same thing last night in the bathroom with you right there in front of him and you couldn't stop him. He needs someone who *can*."

I narrow my eyes when I look back at her. "I hate it when you use logic."

"You know what I love?" she asks, but doesn't wait for me to reply. "I love that we get daily reminders of why we're supposed to be together, why things happened the way they did. Rachel lived and died to prepare me for you. And what she left behind ... she left that for Jasper. For you. And I'm supposed to give that to you."

I realize that I'm crying again halfway through her declaration, but I don't pay attention to it. I'm sure that my nose is bright red, that my cheeks are flamed with color, that my eyes are swollen and bloodshot, but she doesn't seem to mind. So I can't mind. I lean forward and kiss her and I'm pretty sure she knows all the things that I can't say.

Because I can feel her saying them back loud and clear.

*~*~*~

Erica and I are holding hands when we emerge from the basement. She insists on cleaning and reapplying the bandages on my palms, but I don't mind at all. Even her threat of rubbing alcohol doesn't affect me. I'm unaffected because she's *here*. Several people greet us amicably by name and a couple of attendings call out to Erica that they're giving the interns a hard time while she's on vacation. One brave intern even says that he misses her, but he receives an elbow in the ribs from a timid looking girl who clearly does NOT miss Erica in the least. It's nice to know that she hasn't lost *her* mojo. She can still strike fear in the hearts of interns. Hell, even me.

It shocks me that no one reacts to us being a couple anymore. That's what I think about as we walk through the lobby and into the memorial clinic. What Dr. Savoy did to us was on the extreme end of the spectrum. Since then, Erica and I have had it relatively easy. There are no sneers or ugly comments about us, but we've relaxed enough with one another that we don't notice if there are. At first, I looked other people in the face to see if they were going to respond to our clasped hands. Now? I'm usually too busy looking at her to care.

She makes quick work of repairing the damage I inflicted on myself and forgoes the use of rubbing alcohol in favor of antibiotic cream. The fact that she kisses my knuckles in full view of Cristina is a comedy of errors. Yang grabs a wastebasket and pretends to heave into it. Erica threatens to have Yang blacklisted from the surgical board. They go back and forth, but their banter lacks the venom it used to have. And Erica even surrenders the reigns a little and lets Cristina put an unneeded stitch in my hand ... to remind me to watch my temper, she says.

My palm is throbbing, despite Cristina's finesse, when Erica and I head into the cafeteria together. I notice that Rick is sitting with my parents and they're all lost in conversation as we approach. Erica pulls out the chair for me and I sit down, carefully avoiding my father's eyes. There's a moment of awkward, unsettling silence before Rick says, "We were wondering where the two of you had gotten off to."

"Sorry," Erica says, smiling at him. "I didn't mean to leave you hanging."

"She had to help me out," I say, holding up my hands.

Mom quirks a brow. "In a hospital of hundreds of doctors, she's the only one that can wrap a piece of gauze and tape it?"

"She's the only one I want to wrap a piece of gauze and tape it."

"I can understand that," Rick assures me. He winks at Erica and adds, "I'm still amazed at what you can do in the operating room. You are truly gifted."

"Thanks."

In the harsh light of day, Rick appears much older than he really is. Actually, I think maybe I'm simply looking a little closer now that he's exposed himself so thoroughly to me. His skin is sallow under the fluorescent lights of the hospital and when he sees me studying him, he casts a weary glance at me. I think he knows that I've been crying and maybe he's scared that I told her the truth. I force myself to shake my head just enough to reassure him, then lean back in my chair while I listen to everyone discuss the economy, the weather, and Rick's flight out, which will happen later in the day.

What I don't do is hang around to talk to my parents. When they finish their lunch and get up to return to Jasper's room, I keep my eyes on the table. Dad shakes Rick's hand, telling him it was nice to meet him, and then he walks off without a backward glance. Mom actually gives Rick a hug, then she pats me on the shoulder, leans down and says, "Making this harder on us is not the answer, sweetheart. We need you right now."

I don't reply.

Or watch them leave.

My shift is over and I head into the locker room to change. Erica follows me and helps me with the zipper on my jeans, which leads to me assuring her that pants should be optional in every walk of life. When we walk back into the hallway, Lexie is waiting with a chart for me. I doodled over something pertinent and she can't read what it says. I take it and attempt to decipher Addison's handwriting. I finally figure it out and turn in time to see Rick handing Erica a red rose from a candy striper's cart.

The smile on her face is incredible. There was a time that I alone was responsible for its presence. I always knew that Erica would change *me*, but I don't think I fully appreciated how much I've changed *her* until right now. She's not mellow. She'll still go toe to toe with anyone (even me) and she's still got razor sharp edges that can cut you in the blink of an eye, but the walls are gone. The high, stone fence that she had carefully constructed around herself has vanished and I'd like to think that I bulldozed through it the same way she plowed over mine.

A year ago, Erica would not have welcomed Rick into her life so easily. If she had never met me, she never would have gone back to Nebraska and there never would have been a note for him to find. She would still be clinging to her ghosts, saturated in the blood of her past, and she would never let Yang stitch anything unless it was her own mouth. I really believe that I loved her ghosts away ... and she exorcised my demons with the same boldness.

Before I met her, I was the girl in the back of the glass who ate her own hair. Erica continually pulls my hair away from my mouth and out of my lip gloss. She's taught me that being myself, no matter how flawed I am, is okay at the end of the day. And most of all, she's taught me that letting go of someone, the way I had to let go of her for a while and will inevitably let go of Jasper, is just one step ... of a lifetime. You have to say goodbye before you can say hello again. It makes coming home that much sweeter. Until her, I was sleepwalking my way through existence, but now? Now I'm awake and alert and firmly in the present. I am *home*.

I don't have to keep revisiting my past with Jasper because my transgressions with him will be put to sleep one day. I won't be putting a wreath on Jasper's headstone, but I do have to put a wreath on my guilt for what happened with him. It's time to recognize that I can't change anything except the here and now. I have to bury my guilt in order to live again. I know that now. Instead of clinging to it like its a life raft, I have to let it drop beneath the water because it's really a heavy stone ... threatening to drag me down.

As much as I hate it, what happened to Jasper set the course for my life.

And just look at where it has led me.

*~*~*~

Airports.

Coming and goings. Greetings and goodbyes. Formalities and farewells.

Erica goes into the bathroom before her father flies out and I stand next to him, my shoulder rubbing his as we wait for her. This is the part where she needs to be alone. She has to collect herself and she doesn't want either of us to see just how much she's already feeling Rick's absence. I know that Erica has a need to hold onto what she loves with both hands. I feel it acutely at night when she wraps me in her arms and falls asleep easily because she's holding all that matters to her.

She can't do that now.

She has to open her hands and lose her father to distance. Miles and miles will separate them and his voice on the line, regardless of how smooth it is, can never replace the warmth of his arms or the broad chest that she leaned against while we checked his luggage.

"I appreciate what you did for me," Rick says softly. "More than you'll ever know."

"I didn't do it for you. I did it for her. Don't make me regret it."

"All I can give you is the word of an old man, but I'd like to think it means something."

"The old man saying it was also a *lawyer* and a *judge*. That automatically makes you lose credibility." I can't help but laugh at the look on his face. "What? I didn't say I'd be making this easy on you."

My smile seems to take the weight of the world off his shoulders. He stands a little taller, beaming now. "I'd be upset if you did. I like that you'll fight for her."

"She fights for me, too."

"Yes, I know. She made it excruciatingly clear today at lunch that she will cut me out of her life if I do anything to upset you. She didn't bring my brittle bones into the equation, but I still feared for them."

I don't know why, but that fills me with something akin to euphoria. It blinds me with happiness, makes my head swim, and joy rush through my veins. When I was dating George, even when I was married to him, I had this image in my head of who I wanted him to be. I wanted someone who would fight for me, someone who would put me first, someone who could make me feel their shelter in the fury of life's storms ... and that ... that is who Erica is to me. It's like every person before her was a pit stop in a race toward the finish line of love.

I'm here.

And when she comes out of the bathroom, looking a little pale and subdued, I walk forward and give her a kiss. She cups my face, then rubs her nose against mine before we walk Rick to the escalator. I say my goodbye first, giving him a hug and telling him to let us know he's landed okay. After he kisses my cheek ... I give them space to say their goodbyes. I don't go too far, just enough to be out of earshot and away from any intrusion.

We can't take him all the way to his terminal and when he throws up his hand and waves at me, I join Erica in the throng of people. My arms wind around her waist and she leans back against me, letting me support her, allowing me the luxury of holding her upright. He turns and waves one more time before he disappears into the crowd and Erica lifts her hand in response, leaving it suspended there long after he's gone. When she lowers it, she rests it on mine.

Words don't come easily, but she finally says, "Are you going to tell me what *really* happened between the two of you?"

I'm really glad she can't see my face. I'm so eternally grateful that her back is to me that I can barely stand it. I'm sure I look like someone just paraded Sasquatch in front of me; my eyes are saucers in my head. Her question presses the repeat button in my mind and all I can think is 'oh shit oh shit oh shit'. When she turns in my arms and regards me with *that* look ... I shake my head. "No, Yellow. I'm not."

She purses her lips, but nods. "Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay."

I take her hand when she holds it out to me and we walk silently to the car. She unlocks it and opens the passenger door for me. It's overkill and I know she's pulling out all the stops to make me feel as guilty as she possibly can for keeping something from her. When she slides into the passenger seat and puts the key in the ignition, I swallow so loudly that she pats me on the leg. "How do you know that I -"

"You can't lie to me, Lee. You suck at it" She turns a little in the seat to stare at me. "And you're not a hypocrite. You wouldn't lose your temper just because my dad had something to drink. You drink. So the next time you lie to me ... at least make an effort to be convincing."

"I'm sorry. I -"

"I trust your judgment. If you think it's something I don't need to hear then I don't need to hear it."

My skepticism is evident on my face. "Is that right?"

"As long as *you* know whatever it is, I'm confident that it's handled. And ... I'm happy right now. I'm happy that he's in my life. Being oblivious works for me."

It's her way of telling me not to rob her of her contentment. And I wouldn't do that if my life depended on it. I can't hurt her and the truth ... would.

"Do you want to go back to the hospital and see Jasper?"

It takes me only a moment to shake my head. "No. I want to go home and see you."

"Let's go eat dinner first. How about that place you like? The one with the loud jukebox and greasy tables? You like the waffles there. What are they called?"

"'Sunrise waffles'," I reply. "And you hated it."

She shifts into reverse and eases backwards. "I didn't *hate* it. After all, I can thank places like that for clogging the arteries I get to clear. They keep me busy."

"So, you're encouraging me to eat there so that you'll have a reason to crack me open again."

She glances at me. "If I wanted to crack you open ... you'd crack."

"True." I rub my thumb over her cheek, then over the pulse in her neck. "I always do."

After we eat our fill, we head for home. We drive past Seattle Grace and just like I did in Miami on the day that my mother found me in bed with Erica ... I turn in my seat the watch the hospital fade from view. I imagine that I'm pinpointing the square window of dim light that is Jasper's room and I wonder if he's sleeping. I wonder if he knows that his own journey is about to begin.

I wonder if he knows ... that I'm here, just outside ... where I've always been.

"Are you sure you don't want to stop?"

"It's late. He's probably tired."

"It's going to be okay."

I believe that the conviction in her voice is not misplaced. I believe that her ability to make everything okay within *me* will somehow extend to the rest of my family ... to Jazz most of all.

I also believe that she can make me forget and that's exactly what she does in the shower. She scrubs my back, my scalp, and my chases away any kernel of doubt that remains.

The same way that she trusts me ... that's exactly how I trust her.

And when I kneel down in front of her, hot water washing away the remnants of the day, she opens herself up to me. An open book, that's what she is and I read her with my tongue, sliding against her, making her keen. She undulates against my face, her long fingers in my hair as she tells me in explicit detail what she wants me to do. Moments after she comes, my name like a plea on her lips, she pins me back against the wall and does things to me with her hands that make *me* blush.

I grip the handicap rail along the back of the shower with both hands when she kisses a path down my body. I begin to tingle all over and spread my legs a little wider for her. She gives me a tongue lashing the likes of which I've never experienced in my life and the force of my orgasm apparently imbibes me with hitherto unknown strength.

I pull the rail off the wall and fall, taking her with me.

We dissolve into a fit of laughter as pieces of tile shower down on us.

Then we take full advantage of being horizontal until the water runs cold.

I don't think we ever will. Run cold, I mean.

There's a warmth in completion, an inferno in happiness, and a blaze of glory in finally getting it *right*.

*~*~*~*~


	39. Chapter 39

*~*~*~*~

"Baby, dinner's ready."

I stare at the clock on the nightstand. It's just after seven in the evening and my shift ended two hours ago. The pillow under my head is flat and really needs to be plumped, but I don't have the energy to do it. For two hours ... I haven't moved. Not one muscle. Not one inch. Not at all. The digital numbers change and I watch the half hour arrive with all the fanfare of the past three days. None. Nothing happens. I simply breathe. Seventy two hours hasn't changed the fact that my parents have given up on Jasper.

This is what I do: I come home from work and I lie on the bed waiting for the world to change. But it's not going to. In fourteen hours, Jasper will be discharged from Seattle Grace and sent to Rachel's clinic. Erica has shown me the webpage. She's brought me fliers, letters of recommendation, and photo albums from the attic that show all the patients smiling and waving at the camera. Jazz isn't among them. I don't want Jazz to be among them. The only reason I know the date and time that he's leaving is because my mother texted it to me. We're not speaking. I look through my parents if I see them in the hallway and I avoid Jasper's floor at all cost.

I avoid Jasper.

Just like I did when it first happened.

The bed creaks behind me and Erica's arm snakes around my waist. She presses her body against mine and rests her cheek against my hair. "Come and eat with me, Callie. I made your mother's fried chicken just for you. God help me ... I think she would approve."

"I'm sorry. I don't want anything. I'm not ... hungry."

"A funny thing happened while you were showering at the hospital today."

"Yeah?"

"I saw your name on the surgical board for tomorrow at *precisely* the moment that Jasper will be leaving." Her hand moves over my ribcage as she tugs me a little closer. "I took the liberty of rescheduling it for you."

That gets my attention. My eyes widen and I jerk halfway around so that I can see her. The resolve on her face is startling. "You can't do that!"

"Oh, but I did."

"Erica! My patient has been -"

"Your patient was more than happy to postpone for a day. I verified it with him myself." She reaches up, touching just under my eye. I know what she sees there, what's causing her to cringe. I have dark circles that make me look bruised. "Here's the thing ..."

"I really can't deal with a *thing* right now."

"Well, you're going to."

"I cannot believe you rescheduled my surgery! You would break my hand if I did that to you!"

"I'm not into ortho. I'd stab you in the heart."

"Is that an invitation?"

"I'll answer that after I've said my peace."

"Then get your ... thing ... off your chest and leave me alone."

"Okay, fine. I have held your hand when you cried about the fact that it was your idea to take Jasper out on the boat that day. I have listened to you scream while you punished yourself for giving up on him at first and walking out of his life because you couldn't take seeing him that way. And I have even slapped the shit out of you to pull you out of a drug induced coma ... which, I might add you did to yourself because of Jasper's surgery. What I will *not* do ... is let you have another reason to hate yourself for Jasper. So you *will* be there tomorrow when he's discharged. And you will go with him to the clinic and you will STOP THIS because he needs you and you will never be able to forgive yourself if I tell you he asked for you ... and you weren't there."

I turn away from her, slumping back down on the flattened pillow.

"He is, you know," she continues, undaunted. "Asking for you. Every day. He thinks you're still mad at him about what happened in the bathroom. Three days of not seeing you is getting to him. But you know what? He's so talkative that your mother threatened to try to take his batteries out. She said that his mood has completely changed and I agree. He doesn't stop laughing or asking questions or trying to remember things. Derek has found a great combination of meds to even out the chemicals and -"

"Stop. Talking."

"No."

"I - I'll see him when he comes home."

"What do you think it'll be like for him to be left there ... thinking you're mad at him? He's going to believe he's there because he's *bad*."

"STOP TALKING!"

"NO!"

I start to get up, but she holds firm, weaving her other arm around me and holding on tight. "Avoiding him isn't *goodbye*, Lee! Maybe *you* can't stand to see him go, but it's not about you! It's about him! He deserves to hear you tell him that you love him, that you're not mad, that he's going to be okay! You think you're scared!? He's going to be petrified! And you owe it to him to hold his hand!"

"Because it's my fault!?" I ask ... and then I do cry. I haven't yet. Not since the day I demolished the basement of the hospital.

Her cheek goes against my hair again and I feel her breath on my ear. She waits until I sniffle before she speaks. "No. It's not your fault. You owe it to him because he's family. He's Jazz. And you're his buddy."

That final word makes my heart strings play something so catastrophic that I can barely breathe. "I can't do it. I can't."

"You can. Let him lean on you and you can lean on me." She presses her lips against the tender skin of my neck and lingers there. It's a whisper soft touch that sends a shiver through me, echoing her love through every inch of me. My heart strings play another song now, something entirely original, her own composition. It's deafening.

It calms me instantly. One thing that I never want to trade is the ability Erica has to quell my tension with just a touch. It's grounding. It's being on a rocking boat, one that nearly killed me and robbed my brother of fifteen years, and then seeing a lighthouse in the harbor. It's that light, shining on me, filling me with clarity that I've seldom experienced on my own ... much less with the help of anyone else. Slowly, I roll over and face her. She gives me a sweet, solemn kiss. When she moves back a little, I trace her lips with my fingers, then move to the curve of her jaw.

I'm not crying now.

Mostly ... I'm thinking of *her*.

"You're so beautiful," I say, pushing a rogue curl off her forehead. It's that untamable lock of hair that seems to have a mind of its own. Whether she runs a flat iron over it or not, it will lift up and away from her head and then start to spiral by the end of the day. It's a perfect flaw, an irresistible chink her armor. It's as much a part of her as she is a part of me. I'd never be able to iron her out of my life either. I'm curled all over because of her. "I don't really want dinner right now."

The knowing look that appears on her face coincides with me sliding my hand under the front of her shirt. "No? Are you sure? I bought the plumpest chicken breasts that the market had."

I cup *her* breast, massaging her nipple through her bra. "They don't compare."

She doesn't complain when I throw a leg over her and push her onto her back.

I lean.

She lets me.

*~*~*~*~

Hospitals are sterile environments. No matter how much blood is spilled on the floor or vomit splashes the walls, there's always someone there to clean the mess. What can't be cleaned from the hospital is the reverberation of sobs when you tell a person that their loved one has died. You can't clean away the tears that soak through the very foundation of the building and you can't rinse the stains of a broken heart from yourself. That, more than anything, is what I feel when Gavin and I exit the quiet room where a family is coming to terms with their pain. The door shuts on a wail that rattles through me with the force of a screen door in a hurricane and I think of the irony of calling it a quiet room when it's anything but. That room ... is the same one that I professed my love to Erica in after my surgery, after she had sliced me open and healed me. I didn't scream that day, but I don't think I needed to. Those walls absorbed my agony even though it was a quiet declaration all around. From both of us.

Sometimes it's the quiet pain that it really the loudest. She blew my eardrums that day.

"I noticed that you rescheduled your surgery for this morning," Gavin says as we head back toward the emergency room.

"Yeah. Jasper is being released today."

"Wouldn't have sucked for you to clear it with me."

"Sorry. It won't happen again."

He reaches out, resting his hand on my arm. "Who are you and what have you done with Calliope?"

"What?"

"You're not going to be sarcastic about clearing it with me? I hate this. I want the snark back."

I chuckle a little. "Fine. I'll clear it with you when you get a life."

"That was weak. I'm disappointed." He stops walking and leans back against the wall, crossing his arms over his chest. It's one of those things people do that makes it clear they're not finished speaking to you.

Even though I take a few steps away from him ... I turn around and go back when he pointedly clears his throat. "Elvis, have you ever wished for something and then when you get it ... you want to give it back?"

"No. I'm perfectly happy with being so painfully attractive, talented, and skilled. I'm incredible."

"Ass."

"I'm also a very good listener and I suppose it's my job as your boss -"

"You're not the boss of me!"

"Great, Cal, you're sullen *and* four years old. This regression is startling. You were easily eight years old last week."

"This coming from an eternal twelve year old on the cusp of puberty. Did you actually create a single's support group at the hospital, Gavin? Seriously? Are you scared of women or what?"

"What better place to *meet* women than at a single's support group that *I* was sensitive enough, charming enough, and endearing enough to mastermind? I'm their hero now. They think I'm *tender*."

"I think you're an idiot."

"Well, you're not single so you don't count." He shrugs nonchalantly, waving his hand. "And speaking of not being single, what did your girl do to the jackass who was walking around here Halloween night pretending to be a man? Is her father still breathing?"

"I didn't tell her what he said."

Gavin's bottom jaw drops open. "Shit! You're like a bona fide Harry Potter secret keeper."

"And you better be, too. I don't want her to know. It'll just upset her."

"Fine. If I have to keep a secret then you owe me."

"What the hell do I owe *you*?"

"Yang's phone number."

It's my turn to let my jaw scrape the floor. I gasp, stunned. "You like *Yang*!?"

"So?"

"*Yang*!?!"

"I like her ego. She's too good for my single's group even though she's clearly single and I've put four fliers on her car. I'm not used to being resistible." He gives me a cocky grin. "And she hates ortho, but she still sat through Count Dracula telling us about Emma's surgery to impress me. Eager is good. In bed. I bet she has no problem sitting -"

"Gross! I never want to think of *you* near a bed. Especially not with my not friend in the vicinity."

"What's a not friend?"

"Yang!"

"What?"

I turn around in time to see Cristina standing a few feet behind us. She's holding a clipboard and a stopwatch and I know she's putting her interns through their paces today. I watch her blow a wisp of hair out of her face and glance at Gavin, who is watching her closely. His eyes move over her face the same way that Erica's move over mine. I clear my throat and say, "Gavin wants your phone number. He's horny and thinks you'd be eager in bed because you're eager in the OR. Apparently sex can be equated to suturing in his world."

The clipboard in Cristina's hand clatters to the floor.

Gavin sputters.

I win at life.

*~*~*~*~

Along with being sterile, hospitals are also plentiful in hiding places. I've mapped every nook and cranny of Seattle Grace. When I'm angry, I go to the basement and stalk around because I find a measure of peace in the place I used to live. I take to the roof when I'm working on a hard case because watching the city pulsate beneath me reminds me of vitality and why living matters. When I need to be alone, I head into linen closets, supply closets, and occasionally hide behind an oversized refrigerator in the cafeteria because I can steal pastries really easily from there. Of course I haven't been back to that particular spot since someone tried to move the refrigerator out of the way and nearly squashed me in the process. The head cafeteria lady is possibly scarier than Bailey *and* Erica on their worst days.

Unfortunately, between Erica, Mark, and Addison ... they know all of my favorite places to be alone and rarely let me do that.

It's Mark who finds me sitting in the fourth floor linen closet as Jasper's discharge time approaches. He takes one look at me and holds out his coffee cup. I accept it as he sits down on the floor next to me. Taking a sip, I grimace. "If you're not going to load it with sugar and cream, then at least put a shot of tequila in it before you give it to me."

"That bad, huh?"

I nod, give him back the cup, and watch him rub patterns on it with his thumbs. Neither of us speak for a while and I realize that I've never had a problem being alone with Mark. Even at our worst he was able to afford me a level of comfort, of protection, that I really only ever experienced with my dad. Maybe that was my problem with Mark all along. He felt like *family* when he should have been my *lover*. I would take family with him any day of the week as long as he could be there like this. Just comfortable and quiet and there.

"So, here's the thing," he says, holding the cup out to me again. He doesn't speak again until I take it. "Callie, everybody in life has to be rehabilitated at some point. You can't beat yourself up over this. We all have to fix ourselves once in a while."

I'm watching him as he talks to me. His profile is strong, his jaw stubborn. He notices me looking and takes a deep breath before he adds, "You were my rehab. Nobody ever took the time to *teach* me to be a man. Until you. My parents didn't. Addison didn't. I didn't know what real love was until I looked at you and felt it. I did, you know? Every second of the day and I wanted to be what you needed and the thought of that it paying off one day and having you for my wife was all the motivation I needed.

"I'm not mad that you couldn't love me back, Cal. I'm fucking grateful that you let me figure out how to get it *right* with you before I could get it right with Addison. Because I know which mistakes I can't make with her. I know what she needs because you taught me. And Jasper is going to learn to be a man now, too. You have to let him."

I feel my chin tremble and rub my face, trying to hide it. He's not fooled. I know because he puts his arm around my shoulders and pulls me against his chest. "Mark?"

"Yeah?"

"Just in case I never told you ... I don't regret what we had. You rehabilitated me, too."

"That's so much nicer to hear than 'you made me gay'."

I laugh and sit up, smiling at him. "Addison's a lucky woman and this baby ... will have one hell of a dad."

He purses his lips and nods. A myriad of emotions flash over his face all at once and I open my mouth to ask him if he's okay, but he cuts me off by saying, "Karev was going to step up and be a father to Stevens' baby. Meredith told me that. I was ready to give up and walk away because I didn't know if it was mine or his, but I'm a man. I'm the man that you made and if I can accept Atilla the Hahn just because she's a part of you then I can accept this baby, even if it's not mine, because it's a part of Addison. That's how I have to look at it. That's how I stay sane."

I cover his hand with mine, squeezing it. "*You* are also a part of Addison. Even if this baby is not yours ... she wants it to be. And that should make all the difference in the world."

"I really do love her."

"I know.

"God, love makes us crazy."

"And gay. Don't forget gay."

He laughs now and I join him.

When I finally make it to Jasper's room five minutes later, Erica is sitting on the foot of the bed letting him comb her hair. I notice two things ... the bandages are gone from his hands and he's wearing a striped button down shirt that is casually rolled at the sleeves and jeans. Gone are the plaid shirts, the khaki pants pulled too high at the waist, and the sneakers on the wrong feet. So help me God, I hated those clothes, but I still mourn for them all the same. This new Jasper is everything I had hoped he would be and as much as I longed for him to evolve into this man ... the boy is gone. The eternal child that I thought would never grow up ... has.

He is so engrossed in pulling the comb through Erica's hair that he doesn't see me right away. It takes the squeaking of the door as I close it to get his attention and when he sees me, the comb flies into the air behind him and he comes running. His limp is still there. Maybe it always will be and as he yanks me against him in a suffocating bear hug, I am grateful that some scars never go away. The limp will be a constant reminder of our last day together when he was a child ... just like the new clothes are a reminder of our future. I press my face against his neck and smell his shaving cream as he rubs my back.

"Guess what, Lee!?" he exclaims, stepping back and taking both of my hands in his. "I getta go to school! Like you did! 'Member? When you left for school and Mama cried?"

"Yeah, I remember."

"No crying! Okay?"

I nod at him. "Okay."

"I'm gonna get real smart like you and work at the hospital and fix kids like Emma and not use that thing Dirk uses 'cause it hurts and I won't hurt nobody. Deal?" He holds out his hand. "You gotta shake on a - a real deal. Dirk said so."

I put my hand in his and he pumps it enthusiastically, causing me to grit my teeth as the cuts in my palm flare up. "Deal."

When he smiles at me ... he's beautiful. He's always been beautiful, but the animation and the vitality in his eyes are new. It's like a light bulb has come on but instead of being too bright and too blinding ... it's just right. He *understands* so much now. Whoever told him he's going to school is either a genius or very cruel. I don't know which yet. Letting my hand go, he smoothes his palm over his shirt and says, "Dyson bought me new stuff. Like it?"

I turn his collar down and nod. Addison has great taste. "I do like it. You're handsome."

He laughs out loud and claps his hand over his mouth. "Handsome!"

Someone taps on the door behind us and I step out of the way as it opens. Izzie Stevens appears with a stack of paperwork and Derek comes in behind her. I only half listen as Derek gives Jazz another cursory exam, listening to his heart, checking his blood pressure, making small talk with him. Erica joins me on my side of the room and I avoid looking at my parents over the bed. That bed and my brother may as well be an endless abyss that I don't have the ability to jump anymore. What's best for Jasper doesn't matter to me as much as the fact that I was not included in the decision to send him away. They made up their minds without my input, without my help, without realizing that it would destroy me wholly and completely.

When it's time to go, Jasper hops off the bed and hugs Derek. I have to give it to Shepherd, he takes it all in stride, clapping him on the back as he tells him to be good. When Jasper hugs Izzie, I watch her close her eyes over his shoulder as she clings to him. I think sometimes we're quick to dismiss people from our lives a little prematurely. Izzie impacted me in all the wrong ways, but impacted my brother in every right way imaginable. There are tears in her eyes when she steps back, cups his face, and then kisses his forehead. She leaves without another word and Jazz presses his fingers against the spot she kissed, his eyes wide, his mouth slack. "Wow," he whispers. "Oh ... wow."

I'll kill her.

I'll kill her and drop her body in Elliott Bay.

"Erica, would you mind driving us?" Mom cuts through my murderous thoughts. "I think Callie's SUV will be more comfortable for us than our rental. And you know where this place is."

"I'd love to, Lori Anne." Erica glances at my scrubs. "Do you want to change your clothes, Lee?"

I shake my head. "No. I have paperwork to do later. And a consult so I'll - stay like this."

In actuality, I don't want to put on my street clothes. I'm vulnerable in them. I'm *human* in them. Dressed like this? Like a doctor? I can hide behind medicine and possibly view Jasper as just another patient in the sea that I've encountered. I hope. Oh god ... how I hope. When we head out into the hallway and nurses have gathered with cards and coloring books and a necklace made of computer paper ... I know that I'm not hiding at all. I'm an exposed nerve and everything, even breathing, is pricking me to death. I ache.

Hospitals are not just clean and easy to hide in ... when you work in one it has a tendency to become family. Everyone who knows me has shown up to line the hallways as we head to the elevator. Addison gives Jasper a hug, telling him she loves him and then Mark is there, shaking his hand. Everyone from George to Lexie to Bailey to the Chief has come to say goodbye and any false stoicism I was clinging to is rapidly being stabbed to death. I nearly cry when Lexie pats me on the back and leans close, saying, "I'll buy you a drink at Joe's tonight ... if you want."

"I'll keep that in mind," I tell her. "Thanks."

"Anytime." She watches Meredith give Jasper a stuffed dolphin. "Sure will be lonely around here without him to keep us entertained."

I nod because that's the most I can do.

"Luckily," she adds, "his sister is a lot like him. And just as great to know."

When I smile at her, she winks at me and I follow along behind Jazz as he greets the last of his fan club and we step into the elevator. There's no way that the clinic will feel like this. It can't. These people are my coworkers, they're my friends (some, anyway), and they've fallen in love with Jazz because he's been here so long. It's my greatest hope that he doesn't have to stay at a cold, possibly dirty, and rudimentary *clinic* very long.

I make up my mind to hate it before I've even seen it.

*~*~*~

"The lake is over there, through the trees," Erica is saying.

I have to bite my tongue to keep from asking her to stop being a fucking tour guide. I don't care about lakes or tennis courts or or oversized football fields or even the Olympic swimming pool. The large metallic gates that she opened with a special code could have been pearly and Saint Peter himself could have ushered us all in and I would still shoot him in the ass with a pea shooter. I hate this enough to shoot myself with a pea shooter just to feel something that isn't undiluted mental agony. The premises here may be sprawling and dusted with snow, and Jasper may have screamed out loud when he saw the horses, but it's still *here* and not Miami. It's not *home*.

Sending Jasper here and calling it a school doesn't take away what it IS. It's a place for people who are different. And I've spent fifteen years trying to make sure the world didn't treat him that way.

"HORSES!" Jasper crows again and I hear his seat belt click. A moment later, he appears between the bucket seats between me and Erica, his head low so he can see out the windshield. "I can ride the horses. Right, Yellow."

"Yeah, you can," she assures him, then points ahead of us. "There it is, Jazz. That's the school."

I hear him gasp and instead of looking at the building in front of us, I look at him. When did his jaw get so masculine? When did his five o'clock shadow start appearing at noon? Was he so childlike for so long that I only ever saw him like that? He has a dimple in his cheek from grinning so hard and his smile is so much like my own that I can't help but join him. I finally look back at the building and my eyes widen.

People have a tendency to build an image in their head of something new. Before I went to Italy, I had pretty strong ideas about what it would look and smell like. One trip through the canals in a tiny little gondola shocked that image out of my head, but I would still go back in a heartbeat. Some of it was bad, but most of it was extraordinary and as I gaze at the oversized green *house* at the end of a circular sidewalk ... I'm reminded again of what happens when you rush to judgment. This isn't what I envisioned. I imagined a nondescript brick structure of some kind, almost prison like, with a large fence (probably electrified) and maybe a sandbox in one corner where the patients could get dirty.

But the place I stare at as Erica parks is the complete opposite.

Two stories tall, the clinic is not overly large, but it's homey and welcoming. In fact, a large white sign is hanging from the second story balcony with the words 'Welcome Jasper' written a little crookedly in blue paint. Even from the parking lot, I can see that there are hand prints on it in varying shapes and sizes. Clearly, it was a group effort. Jasper starts telling my dad to let him out the second Erica shuts the engine and when my dad steps out of the way, Jasper bounds out behind him and runs to the sidewalk, staring at his fate. It's cold outside but I don't think he notices. I join him on the sidewalk, my hand on his back. "Jasper -"

"It's pretty! I'm staying here, right? Right?"

"Yeah, you're staying here."

"Are you staying here?"

I shake my head. "No. I can't."

He blinks a few times and then turns to look at our parents, who are wrestling with his suitcases. "Is Mama staying?"

"Mom's not staying either."

"What about Daddy?"

"No, Jazz. Only you. This is *your* school."

He rubs the scar on his scalp, his forehead creasing. "Well, can Yellow stay then?"

His voice is heavy with emotion, thick with a lonesomeness that he's never experienced in his life. For the first time ever, he's going to be by himself. Isn't that sickening? I opened up his head, his mind, and his memories just so he could be left alone with them. I want to grab his hand and run back down the never ending driveway that brought us here. I can't do that, however. What I can do ... is comfort him in a way that I didn't have the strength to do when he was first injured. I lace my fingers through his and rub his arm as I gaze up at him. "You listen to me, Jasper, you don't need any of us here. Not for this. You get to do it on your own and you're going to be just fine. You're strong enough, but I'll come and visit you every chance I get. I will. I'll be here all the time. And you will be okay. I promise."

He cuts his eyes over at me. "I think I said no crying."

"Well, stop making me."

Taking a deep breath, he looks back at the building. "Will there be friends for me here?"

"Absolutely."

"Okay then."

We're halfway down the sidewalk when the doors open and a stream of people come out. Jasper falters just a little, but then Erica is on his other side and loops her arm through his. As soon as the patients see who it is, they come rushing to her and with the same care she had at their party, where she introduced me for the first time, she introduces Jasper. The smile never leaves his face as he shakes one hand after another and answers a ton of questions. One boy that I've never seen before wants to know who cut Jasper's head and Jasper is telling him all about Dirk and his 'bad machine' as the patients lead Jasper into the building, milling around him.

Jim hugs Erica and then turns to me, opening his arms. It's not possible to dislike Jim. He's been so welcoming and when he calls Erica every week ... he asks to speak to me, usually to tell me an off color joke or something I can do to annoy Erica for him. We've had a few dinners with him since the party and he's always got a smile on his face ... Rachel's smile. He gives me a kiss on the cheek and then turns to my parents. He's so genuine that I watch my mother fall under his spell within a matter of seconds and when he assures her that he will take care of her baby ... I know that she wishes she had another daughter she could marry off to him. He leads her into the building while Erica and I help my dad with Jasper's bags.

The interior of the clinic is warm and inviting. The walls of the main foyer are painted yellow and there are photographs that cover almost every inch of the it, from floor to ceiling. It reminds me of Hogwarts, but I keep that to myself and say a silent prayer of relief that the photos are still and no one is moving. I can't take being scared on top of stressed today. We move through the foyer and then down a wide hallway where more photographs line one wall, but a mural decorates the other. Colorful rainbows and animals have been painted all along it and Jasper seems as impressed as I am because he reaches out to touch it, then draws his hand back.

That's when Geneva appears, her black hair pulled away from her ebony skin. She's even more beautiful than I remember from the party, when she sat just a few inches from me and hummed along to the music. Erica said that her boyfriend beat her so much that her brain was damaged. He left her face intact, but robbed her of the ability to play the piano. And that was her life. "You can pet the elephant if you want to," she tells him, resting her own fingers against it. "He don't bite none."

Her fingers are as long and slender as I remember and she giggles when Jasper puts his hand so close to hers that they touch. A moment later, she sees me and says, "CALLIE! ARE YOU HERE TO PLAY THE PIANO!? COME ON! I CAN SHOW YOU!"

She reaches for me, but Erica intercepts her. Very gently, Erica says, "I'm sure that Callie will be happy to play for you in just a few minutes, Geneva, but right now she wants to see Jasper's new room."

"Oh." Geneva looks thoughtful. "Well, can I go, too?"

"You can come!" Jasper tells her and he takes the hand that usually remains rather limp at her side. She doesn't seem to mind and we continue down the hallway.

At the very end, we're led into a large corner room. I gasp at the same time that Jasper does and this time *I* touch the wall. It's like living in the ocean. There are dolphins, whales, starfish, and a huge treasure chest painted on the walls. The bed is covered with a dolphin comforter and the lamp in the corner has boats and anchors on it. Jasper is in heaven. He leaves Geneva standing next to Erica and moves to the middle of the room, holding his arms wide as he spins in a circle. "I remember dolphins on my ceiling, but I like 'em on my wall."

He's thinking of his mural lamp.

I think maybe *I* will need that damn lamp after this.

And to curl into a fetal position and eat my hair.

"There are a few papers to sign," Jim tells my parents. "Why don't you follow me? A nurse will come in and help Jasper unpack."

The nurse in question appears in the doorway and the fact that Geneva greets her with a hug makes me believe that she's not the devil incarnate, but I reserve the right to change my mind.

"Let me show you around," Erica says, looping her arm through mine. "What do you say?"

"Okay." I turn and glance back, watching as Geneva helps Jazz lift his suitcase and the nurse unzips it, exclaiming over a pair of shoes tucked away inside. I'm mourning over the fact that it's not *me* helping him when Erica leads me to a large room that is dominated by a piano. There are chairs set up around it like an orchestra and she points to a wall in the back of the room where black instrument cases are neatly stacked.

"Whatever he wants to learn, they'll try their best to teach him. Geneva is amazing with a tambourine." She doesn't speak for a few seconds, then she points at another door and we go through it. "The art room."

"Jesus," I gasp. The patients apparently enjoy abstract art because the walls, the floor, and all surfaces are splattered with every color in a box of Crayola. The big box. "They're very creative."

"Every couple of months they put on coveralls and the staff helps them scrape all the paint up so they can start again. The walls are not really sheet rock in here. They're a special board that you can clean easily. The floor, too. You won't find a single person here who will put so much as a pencil mark on a wall outside of this room."

I gravitate toward an easel where someone has painted a yellow bus with a throng of little stick figures. A green house is in the background and the word 'hume' as been written at the top. Home. They think of it as home. It revives the hollowness that was starting to diminish. "I don't want him to stay here forever."

She hugs me. "Home is where the heart is, Callie. Be glad that this place is good enough to be welcomed into their hearts. It is, you know? They're going to take care of him here. And we can come out during the week, hell ... every single day if you want. Whatever you want."

"Thank you."

"I can't stand it when you're upset."

"It'll be okay. I know."

"No, you don't. But you will." She takes my hand in hers and nods back the way we came. "Want to see the kitchen?"

"Okay."

Something smells like heaven and Erica greets the staff like long lost friends. She doesn't stop holding my hand as she introduces me as her fiancé and no one bats an eyelash over it. They actually give us warm cookies which I don't mind at all since they're gingerbread and I have a thing for that. I watch her hug a couple of women and thank them for the cookies. One of them tells Erica that I'm pretty and she agrees, making me blush. Next, Erica shows me the cafeteria, which isn't very big, but looks comfortable. We stand in the doorway, not interrupting lunch for the patients inside, and I try to picture Jasper among them, sitting at one of the round tables with new friends. Everyone is laughing inside. Everyone is chattering and eating and *happy*.

Do they even know that there is a big world outside of this place?

Erica finally takes me to a long, rectangular room where blackboards cover every available surface and adult sized desks are lined up neatly in perfect rows. "There are four classrooms. This is the only one in the main house. Behind this there are three trailers where they teach the patients everything from reading and writing to balancing a checkbook and counting money. The goal is never for anyone to STAY here, Callie. They want people to be self sufficient so they can move on."

"Why trailers?"

"Well, budgets and funding are always an issue with a place like this. They outgrew the space before we could afford to remodel."

I file that information away as she shows me the bedrooms and bathrooms upstairs and the staff quarters in the basement. In total, they can rehabilitate forty patients at a time. Right now, there are only twenty two. Jasper, she tells me, got the best room they have. We're coming up from the basement when we meet my parents and Jim in the foyer again. They have apparently gotten a tour of their own and are smiling brightly with the results of it. Mom seems to forget the battle lines that we've drawn because she grasps my hand and says, "Isn't it nice? Oh, Callie, he's going to love it here."

I lean down and hug her. "Yeah, he will."

"And it's so close to your house. You can be right here in a flash if he needs you, sweetheart."

When we pull apart, her eyes are glistening. She clears her throat, studying Erica. "Jim told us about Rachel and ... what happened to her. I'm sorry for your loss. honey. But I'm very glad that you're in our family now. Thank you for this ... Yellow."

Oh. My. God.

Mom just called Erica 'Yellow'.

They meet halfway across the foyer, hugging, and I melt so much that I forget that I'm pissed at my dad and smile at him. He winks at me.

And then ... then the sound of a piano being played fills the building and Jim looks astonished. "Hmm. No one here can - who is -"

We all follow him and I drop my purse when I see Jasper sitting at the piano squinting at an open song book in front of him. He hits a few sour keys, then quickly gets a handle on his fingers. 'Amazing Grace' eventually flows beautifully and when he finishes, he turns and looks at us, beaming with pride. "I played it," he announces. "That was me."

Amazing Grace.

How sweet the sound.

*~*~*~*~

"He didn't cry?" Addison is sitting across from me in a booth at Joe's while Erica and Mark try to beat each other at darts nearby. When I shake my head, she narrows her eyes. "But you did."

"Not yet. I had to go back to work and do some stuff. But I fully intend to cry."

"Look, I'm hormonal as hell so if you plan on doing it any time soon ... don't. I hate sympathy crying and I'll have to do it because you're you and I seem to love you."

I throw a peanut at her and sip my gin and tonic. Lexie delivered it herself the minute I walked in and sat down. She keeps glancing over to see if I need a refill, but I don't. I probably won't. I need to feel life with a clear head if I'm ever going to understand it. Or make peace with it. I crack a nut for myself and chew it slowly. "Jazz played the piano."

"Really?"

"He hated piano lessons growing up. I didn't think he had learned anything at all, but he read the music today. He read the music and he can't even read his name. He - I - maybe I don't know him like I think I do."

"You do know him. Derek just opened up different facets of him. There will be revelations about him from here on out. Anytime you unlock somebody and set them free ... anything can happen." She glances at Mark when she says those last few words. "I think - no - I *know* that things happen for a reason."

"Are you thinking of Alex or Mark?"

"I'm thinking of me." She meets my eyes and shrugs. "What? I'm incubating a child. I can be as self absorbed as I want to be. And I think that me leaving New York and then leaving Seattle gave me perspective. As much as I loved being with Naomi and Sam and not having it rain all the time ... I'm happier here. I'm happy in daily surgeries covered in placenta and blood. I'm happy watching my ex-husband romance a *child* and I'm happy learning new things about you. I knew you wanted Erica the first time I saw you with her. Seems like we all learn a little something new about the people we love every day."

I grin at her. "Oh yeah? What did you learn about Mark today?"

She watches him throw a dart and embed it in the wall. "I learned that he's traded in the Yankees onesie for a Yankees wardrobe and that he's going to turn my kid into the sports fan from hell. And I don't mind."

"A wardrobe?"

She nods. "We have enough 'official team merchandise' to see this baby through the college years. *I* can wear some of it."

"Maybe you should wear it out, Addison. As in ... ruin it. It's possible that this kid won't like baseball."

"Are you kidding? This kid either has Karev's DNA or Sloan's DNA. Either way, I'm going to be clocking a lot of hours in bleachers. I feel it already."

"And you wouldn't change it for the world."

"Well, no. But I can still bitch about it and pretend."

"It is a mother's right."

She laughs. "Speaking of mothers ... how are things with yours?"

"She told Erica she was glad to have her in the family today."

Addison's eyes widen. "No shit?"

"None."

"Did she bump her head?"

"No, I think maybe she opened her mind. Jasper's surgery ... dare I hope that he's not the only one who's learning?"

"I just told you ... we're all learning. All the time. Even Lori Anne." Addison glances at the dart board when Erica starts to laugh at something Mark said. "Erica's pretty amazing. I'd say you did well for yourself, Callie."

"Thank you for making me realize what was there all along, Addison." I lift my glass and hold it in front of me. "To clarity."

"To clarity," Addison says, clicking her water glass to mine. "The best damn feeling in the world."

"No, that would be orgasms."

"True."

I watch Erica throw a dart, knocking Mark's only one off the board. She bends down to pick it up and her pants tighten on her backside, causing me to lick my lips. With nothing but dirty thoughts in my head, I pick up my purse and say, "I'll see you tomorrow."

"You're so obvious."

"I know. Hope she notices."

I throw up a hand at Lexie, mouthing 'thanks' for my drink, and pull Erica's coat off the hook. She takes it, regarding me with a curious expression. "Let's go home, Yellow."

"We've only been here an hour."

"So?"

"We really need to do something about your anti-social tendencies."

"I plan on being very, very social actually. With you."

"Fair enough. Let's go."

We leave Mark laughing at our eagerness and I wait until we're outside in the lightly falling snow before I kiss her. Her nose is cold against mine and when we break apart, I rub mine against it. She grips my head and kisses me again, harder and more insistently than before. I slip my arms under her jacket and pull her flush, feeling her body press against mine. It ignites every nerve ending. When we come up for air, I open my mouth to tell her that I love her, but a loud truck rumbles past and hits a puddle of water. It splashes up over my back and I yelp in surprise, but it's not loud enough to drown out the shout from the truck.

"Woo! Lesbians! Fuckin' hot!"

I turn my head in time to see a bearded man leer at us from the passenger window of the truck. Erica stiffens and when I turn back to her, she's watching me closely, waiting for a reaction. I can read it on her face ... she's afraid that I'll freak out.

"What?" I ask, shivering from the water trickling down my back. "We know we're hot."

Her smile is awash with relief, with pride, with love and with glee as she takes her coat off and wraps it around me. "Yeah. We are."

"But I'm also cold as hell."

"Come on. We'll build a fire at home."

"Let's build one in the car." I raise a brow. "I need to get out of this wet shirt anyway."

"I like the way you think."

"Want to like me naked?"

"All day. Every day."

"Prove it."

*~*~*~*~

"You slept with Gavin Cole."

"Oh my god! He told you!?"

I shake my head at Cristina. "No, ass. You're HERE. Volunteering to *sing* at this fucking ... fund raiser thing. Only sex or the promise of someone's insides on the outside would get you here. Especially when these rehearsals drag on this late. And I happen to know that ortho doesn't have any big surgeries coming up."

"Fine. I slept with Gavin Cole. And it was good so shut up." She groans and flips through a music book. "He won't let me sing 'Like A Virgin'. That's what I know."

"He made you feel like a virgin?"

"Touched for the very first time."

"Ew."

"What are you going to sing?"

"Hell if I know. He keeps changing his mind." I flip through my own book. "He wrote a duet and is making me do that with him. Oh, and he suggesting some Celine Dion song that -"

"YOU CAN SING CELINE DION, BUT I CAN'T SING MADONNA!? MADONNA OWNS CELINE!"

Gavin clears his throat and puts his finger over his lips, shushing us. I watch him sit down at the piano he's rented for the big benefit and crack his knuckles. I rub my forehead when George and Lexie start to warble their way through 'Sleigh Ride'. I endure it with minimal damage, but have to hide my face behind the book when they launch into 'Rudolph'. "Santa needs to bring them some buckets to carry a tune in," I mutter. "This was not going to be a Christmas thing when I signed up for it. It's not even Thanksgiving yet and I'm already burned out on all of it."

"Well, he changed his mind. He said that the Halloween thing was so much fun for the kids that he wanted to do something special for them." Cristina hides behind her own book, trying not to laugh when George's voice breaks like Peter Brady's. "And besides, most people are charitable as hell during the holidays. They'll pay these two to shut the fuck up."

"Maybe they should dress as elves and pass the donation plate instead." Addison arrives, clutching a package of crackers and a water bottle. "That's what I'm doing. I can't sing. I can't dance. But I can do a thousand yard death stare at people to make them pay up."

"What are you doing here? Elves don't have to rehearse," I say.

"My patient has been in labor for twenty hours. I have no doubt that she will go into labor the second I get home. So, here I am. Waiting." She offers me a cracker and I take one. "I think I'll give myself a c-section to avoid this."

"Ugh. Baby talk." Yang gets up and walks away, no doubt going to torment Lexie and George over their poor performance. Moral boosting is not Cristina's strongest suit. I think I *will* make her wear pink for the wedding.

"How was Jasper's first week?" Addison asks.

"Good, I think. We went out and spent the day with him yesterday. He already knows all the horses by name and made a thing in pottery that might have been a cup at one time, but now it's a rock."

She laughs. "How are you holding up?"

"It helps that he calls me every night. I talk to him more now than I did when he was at home."

"Are your parents still flying out tomorrow?"

"Yeah, but they're coming back for Thanksgiving. Erica's letting my mother have full reign of the kitchen and you are Mark are invited."

"Thank God. We were going to have to eat McDonald's that day. I hate cooking." She gives me another cracker. "Will Jasper be at your house for Thanksgiving?"

"Yeah. We're getting him the night before. He misses Buddha so Mom's bringing the damn dog again. I'll have to listen to the cats hiss and the dog bark all night."

"Speaking of dogs ... I bought Hope a sweater because she's in and out of the doggie door so much that she *has* to get cold. She's so cute when she's -"

"Addison."

"What?"

"Do I bore you with stories about Ruma and Feo?"

"Well, no. But what can you possibly tell me about them that isn't eclipsed by their ugliness?"

"You fell in love with the dog."

"Your mother was scandalized when I told her that *you* suggested the name 'Hope'. That is your sister in law's name!"

I laugh. "Well, she's a dog a lot of the time. Remember Jasper's birthday?"

"Don't name my dog after bitches! It's rude!" Addy tilts her head to one side, listening to Gavin sing. "He's really good."

"He's okay."

"Just like I have a fondness for my dog ... you have a fondness for Elvis."

"I confess that I only think of maiming him once a day instead of once a minute now."

"I heard a rumor that Emma's going to be performing all of these songs in sign language for the hearing impaired. Is that true?"

"That is true. The documentary crew thought it would be nice to show her doing something for charity. They want to show her being a little girl with a big heart."

"I think that's nice."

A nurse volunteers next and does a nice enough rendition of 'Santa Baby'. Then Miranda Bailey stuns me by singing 'Away In a Manger' so beautifully that I could cry. She does an a capella version of 'Silent Night' and I stand up and clap for her at the end. She bashfully dismisses the small crowd and walks off the stage and then Gavin points at me. "Fuck. Make it twice a day that I think of maiming him."

"Go sing, rockstar! And don't screw up. My patient may go into labor before you're done and I don't want to miss it!"

I trudge to the stage and take the spot that Gavin vacates at the piano. He knows that I'm not happy with the song choices that he's given me. For a second, I contemplate banging out some Fiona Apple just to illustrate how emo this entire thing is making me, but I change my mind. I settle on 'O Holy Night' instead and I don't need the sheet music. Jasper used to make me play it in the middle of summer because he loved it so much. I move over the keys with my eyes closed and I sing it with all that I am.

Everyone stands up when I'm finished and I smile, nodding my head to acknowledge it. Gavin picks up his guitar and says, "Do you want to practice the one I wrote?"

"We've done it a million times. Are you changing that, too?"

"Oooh, cranky."

"I had four surgeries today and I haven't had dinner. Unless you want me to kick your ass, I'd say that we're done."

"Fine. What other song are you singing? Besides 'O Holy Night'?"

"The duet?"

"No, you have to sing three."

"How in the hell did you arrive at that conclusion?"

"Because that's what we need to fill out the show." He glances into the corner where George and Lexie are sitting. "And let's face it ... the good needs to outweigh the absolutely hideous. Please?"

"Dear God ... I didn't know you knew that word."

"Keep talking and you can sing four."

"I'm going home. Good night, Elvis."

"Good night, Calliope." He starts to strum 'Jingle Bells', playing it a little slower than he should as he tunes his guitar.

"By the way, Yang liked it. You should do it again."

I laugh when the guitar hits a note that isn't meant for human ears and walk off the stage.

When I grab my coat, I notice that Erica is standing in the doorway of the auditorium. She's got a smile on her face and I return it easily. It's funny ... if she had asked me to sing for this benefit ... I'd play her a million songs a day. And the fact that she stopped by to listen to me? I feel like I have the biggest fan club in the entire world because even if she's the only one in it ... she *is* the world to me. I wish Addison luck with her patient and hurry across the room when Cristina starts to sing 'Frosty the Snowman'. She warbles it in such a deep, croaking baritone that she sounds like she swallowed all three of the Budweiser frogs.

Erica is laughing hard when I join her and she grabs my hand, pulling me along behind her. When we reach the on call room, she tugs me inside and shuts the door behind her. I watch her toe off her shoes and grin at her. "You can't wait until we get home, Yellow?"

"Nope. Because your *parents* are at our place and I just heard you sing ... which does something below the belt that is neither fair nor unappreciated."

Her shirt winds up on the lamp shade and she's got mine off before I can reply. We fall back on the bed and fumble with our pants until we're finally bare at last. When she slides against me, I lift my hips and sigh into her mouth as one of her thighs moves between mine. I lower my hand and press against her, moving my fingers like I'm playing a piano. "Erica-"

"What are you doing? Oh ... god ... I like it ... whatever it is."

"I'd say I'm tickling the ivory. Wouldn't you?"

She pushes herself up on one elbow and smiles at me. "Well shit. I was planning on buying you a piano for Christmas, but there's no way now. Play me all you want."

"You want to buy me a piano?"

"It's like foreplay. Musical foreplay."

I give her a kiss, stroking her face, and then I put pressure on her shoulders to remove any doubt of where I want her to go. "In that case ... make me sing."

She does.

Oh how she does.

My parents are in the bed by the time we get home. Erica and I sit at the island in the kitchen giggling like teenagers as we eat the casserole that my mother made. We can't stop laughing about the fact that Webber came into the on call room after we were dressed and ready to leave ... and then tripped in his haste to leave, muttering that he was 'sorry, so sorry, ladies'.

We're loading our plates into the dishwasher when Erica's phone vibrates. I wipe down the counter as she digs through her purse to locate her Blackberry. I'm drying my hands when she taps me on the shoulder and holds it out to me. I put the paper towel in the trash and hit the scroll to relight the screen and then I smile.

Jim has sent us the nightly picture of Jasper.

My brother is sitting at the piano the same way I was earlier and his eyes are crinkling with laughter as he looks at Geneva, who is next to him on the bench. I move my thumb over the picture, imagining that I can feel his face, trace his dimple, touch the scar on his head. A picture tells a thousand stories. You need only walk down our hallway to know that. Film inks pieces of your soul, captures your vulnerability, and preserves the best and worst moments in time. Erica's photos from her childhood are hollow and uncomfortable. Mine are exuberant and mischievous.

And I'm no longer looking at a child when I see Jazz now.

It took him fifteen years to spread his wings and fly into adulthood.

It took me just as long to do the same.

Here we both are.

Free at last.

Well, he is.

I still have to fucking sing, don't I?

*~*~*~


	40. Chapter 40

*~*~*~*~

When Jasper was five and I was fifteen, he barreled off the school bus and showed me a piece of paper that had his name on it. He had written it a dozen times before he ever went to kindergarten, but there was something in the accomplishment of doing it at school that made it different for him. It was different for me, too. We were home alone and I stuck it to the refrigerator with magnets and then picked him up, sat him on the island, and we cracked open a container of ice cream to thoroughly ruin our dinner. Both of us had to go to bed early because of the stomach aches we had and just before I dozed he crawled into my bed and put his head on my shoulder. He handed me his favorite book at the time(Where The Wild Things Are) and I read it to him twice.

I remember leaning my face against the curls on his head and breathing him in. He fell asleep first and I went downstairs to get a drink in the kitchen, where I spent an hour looking at his name on that damned paper. I was proud of him, but at the same time, I was devastated to think that the day was approaching when he would no longer want me to read him a bedtime story. Writing his name felt like a step he was taking away from me and it was selfish and wrong to be upset about it, but I was. He was growing up so much faster than I wanted him to. I knew, looking at that paper, that the day would come when he would be taller than me, stronger than me, and walk away from me. His independence was that much closer. I could actually see it on the horizon.

Thanksgiving finds Jasper writing his name on a new piece of construction paper. My brother, the one who fumbled every time he held a pen just a few months ago, has written his name. His 'S' is backwards. His 'E' is capitalized instead of lower case. And it's beautiful. He traced his hand, put eyes on the thumb, and glued different colored paper slips on the fingers to make feathers. It's a turkey, he assures me. And even though I hate birds with a fiery passion, Jasper's turkey finds a place of honor on the refrigerator. "This is great, Jasper."

"You get to keep it," he says. "I did it for you. On account of it being Thanksgiving."

I give him a big hug and turn down the collar of his shirt. He has two of the buttons open and his hair has gotten long enough now to curl around his ears. Whether he realizes it or not, he's gorgeous. "Are you hungry? Dinner should be ready soon."

"I want some cake. Why do we have to eat that last when it's the best part?"

"Well, you have to eat real food first. We've got ham and turkey and -"

"Turkey?"

I nod at him. "You know that Mom makes the best turkeys and -"

"A REAL TURKEY!?!" His eyes fly to the refrigerator and then he points at his art. "WE ARE EATING THAT!?!!"

Oh shit. "Uh ... it ... it's what people do. For Thanksgiving, Jazz. They eat turkey and -"

"TURKEYS HAVE BABIES! I GOT TO PET ONE! AND NOW WE KILLED IT!?!"

"No! No, we didn't kill it! It was already dead when we bought it."

"WE BOUGHT IT!? DEAD!?! OH MY GOD!" Jasper throws his hands up in the air, scandalized. "AND YOU WANT ME TO EAT IT!? LEE! THAT'S SICK!"

I watch him cross his arms over his chest and scowl at me. I suddenly feel responsible for the slaughter of millions of turkeys worldwide, like I am the one who broke their necks ... or shocked them. Whatever they do to them. I don't know. Jasper's nostrils flare and I watch his brown eyes fill with tears. Explaining the food chain really isn't something that I want to do. The circle of life only ever sounds good when Elton John sings about it. To distract my brother from the harsh reality of being a carnivore, I offer him a deviled egg.

He frowns at it, then up at me, shaking his head. "That's an egg. It pops out of a chicken's butt and I'm not touching it! It's hard shelled poop! That's what it is!"

"So ... you're a vegetarian now, buddy?"

"Don't call me names, Lee! I'll tell!" His eyes narrow. "What's a veg ... veg ... that thing you said?"

"A person who doesn't eat meat."

"Are turkeys meat?"

"Yeah."

"Then I am a ... that thing you said."

I rest my hand on his shoulder. "People eat meat, buddy. It keeps us healthy and -"

"I got a feather in my mouth when I was holding a turkey and it was gross!"

"Well ... we take the feathers off."

"You pluck them!?! Geneva got in trouble for that! You are bad! That's bad! Jim says that turkeys need feathers to keep them warm! Is that why you got it in the oven now? Because you plucked it and it's cold!?!"

Someone clears their throat behind us and I turn around to see Jim standing in the doorway, an empty glass in his hand. He fills it with water from the refrigerator door, staring overlong at Jazz's turkey, and takes a sip before he speaks. "We've been learning about animals this week," he says, looking sheepish. "We had a trip to a petting zoo where we discovered farming and got to play with all kinds of ... fowl. It probably wasn't the best timing on our part."

"Clearly," I tell him, smiling. He has snow in his hair. A white Thanksgiving, that's nice. "Did you guys find a Christmas tree?"

"We did. Your father bought the largest one on the lot," Jim assures me. "Erica's in the living room attempting to find a big enough spot for it. And your mother already has the decorations organized. She's ... thorough, that one."

"Oh god. I better go help." I glance at Jazz. He has a toothpick in his hand and is poking the deviled eggs like they should sprout legs and run while they can. "You want to come help, buddy?"

"Why? Is the tree dead, too?"

Jim clears his throat. "Why don't you go and see how Buddha is, Jasper? You wanted to show me the gazebo in the back yard, remember? I'll be out there in a few minutes."

"Yeah. Okay." Jazz slips off his stool and trudges across the room.

Jim waits until he vanishes through the arched doorway before he speaks. "He's doing incredibly well, Callie. Far better than I expected. And I know that Dr. Shepherd is shocked at his progress as well."

"It's definitely amazing," I agree. "How are his mood swings?"

Leaning against the counter, Jim shrugs a little. "He has his moments. He's very sensitive at times and at other times ... he's fine. He loses his temper when he's overwhelmed, but we can count on him to step in and try to diffuse the situation if someone else is having a bad day. And he's learning so fast. We only have to tell him something once and he gets it."

My eyes move to the turkey on the fridge. "Was it easy to teach him his name?"

"Absolutely. And he's reading music fluently. He plays for us every night. New songs that he can't know from memory."

"He used to hate the piano." I put the lid back on the deviled eggs and sigh. I'm seeing the horizon again ... and it's Jasper's retreating back that I focus on. Independence is just over the rise for him. "It was my idea, you know? For him to have the surgery. I'm afraid that it was ... the wrong thing to do. There's so much for him to ... come to terms with."

"You mean about the accident itself?"

"That ... and everything else. He's going to blame me for it. It - it was my idea to go out in the boat that day. And it was my idea for him to have the surgery. When he finally understands everything ... he might hate me."

Jim puts his glass down and takes my hand, patting it reassuringly. "How can you say that? I saw Jasper at your birthday party and he was like a little boy then. Now? Well, now he's seeing the world for the first time as a man and it's amazing to him. He's amazed at life, Callie. What he sees when he wakes up every morning is a day full of promise, of new things to experience and see, and he's happy. He is. You should hear him laugh when he *gets* the joke. This was the right thing to do. Believe me, it was."

I nod, but I'm unconvinced. I can tell that Jim sees it because he leans a little closer to me and adds, "Look at it like this ... you are waking up every morning to a day full of promise and new things, too. With Erica. And you're happy. A blind person could see that. And I know that it was hard for the two of you at first because you had a guy in your life and then your property was vandalized and the two of you couldn't figure out what you wanted ... but you get it now. And it was worth it. Right?"

"Definitely worth it."

"Well, Jazz will feel the same way. Nothing worth having ever comes easy. He'll fight to come to grips with his life the same way you had to fight to come to grips with who you are. Both of you are on journeys, Callie. Both have been a long time coming."

I laugh a little. "You should have been a lawyer, Jim. You're very convincing."

"Are you convinced?"

"I'm getting there."

Mom comes in to check the turkey and Jim takes it out of the oven for her. I go into the living room in time to see a gargantuan tree go up in the corner. My dad appears from behind it, dabbing at his face with a handkerchief and when Erica stands up ... she has pine needles stuck all through her blond hair. Jasper, who is sitting on the arm of the love seat, slaps his leg and points at them both. "And that," he says, "is what you get for cutting down a tree! We're supposed to *love* the trees."

With that, my brother zips his jacket, pulls on leather gloves, and walks happily out the back door. I hear him yell for Buddha and open my mouth to speak, but Dad says, "Great! My son is a liberal tree hugger!"

"And a vegetarian," I say. "He's very upset about the turkey. And its lack of feathers."

Erica makes a face. "So that's why he said we should cook the cats. He said their feathers were already gone anyway and we cook everything else."

I laugh.

I laugh until my sides ache.

And I keep laughing long after dinner is over. Erica and I are alone, rehashing the day on the sofa, our fingers twined together as we talk about Jasper's reaction to the turkey. "Did you see his face?" I wheeze. "When Dad started carving the bird?"

"Oh my god! I thought he was going to scream."

"Screaming would have been better than calling us all murdering assholes."

Erica is laughing so hard that she has tears rolling down her cheeks. "Your mother was mortified. Did you see the way she picked up her knife and glared at Jim? Like he taught him that word?"

"Jim nearly ran. He scooted his chair back. I could practically see the gears grinding in his head."

"Thank God for Mark," Erica says, and then sobers instantly. "I actually just said that ... didn't I?"

"Well, he did save the day." I rub my stomach, which has been stuffed to capacity with good food. "I cannot believe he diffused the situation like that."

"I cannot believe that Jasper dug into the turkey after that!"

"Mark did tell him that birds would eat us unless we ate them first."

"That was horrifyingly ingenious."

I shudder. "And true. Don't forget true. Birds are EVIL."

"You're kinda pathetic. You know that, right?"

"Basically. Yeah."

She grins at me. "Speaking of pathetic ... did you see the way Mark was with Addison? It was nauseatingly cute."

"You better take notes, Yellow. I expect the same thing when I'm pregnant one day."

"You actually want me to harp on every bite you take and obsess about how much protein you're getting?"

"Okay, maybe not that part. But the backrubs, fetching of water, and sharing of dessert will be much appreciated."

"He didn't *share* his chocolate cake with her. He let her have all of it."

"His kid eats a lot."

She squeezes my hand. "Do you think it's his, Cal?"

"I don't think it matters," I reply honestly. "Addison said that they've decided to wait until after the baby is born to run the paternity tests. I - I really wouldn't be shocked if they decided NOT to do it at all."

"Really?"

"Really. I think that Mark will take one look at the kid and fall in love. Nothing will matter after that."

"I hope you're right."

"I'm *convinced* that I'm right." I lean over, giving her a kiss, then pick up the box that my mother brought us from Miami. "I think these are the pictures you asked for, Yellow."

"I thought those were more decorations for the tree!" Erica sits up, gazing at the box with reverence.

"Nope. She said she left them on the table."

"Really?"

"Really." I pull the ribbon from around the cardboard and pluck the tape off the lid. Inside, nestled between tissue paper, are tons of large photos from my childhood. I see my favorite picture of me and Jasper on the very top. He's not quite a year old in it and he's standing in front of me, his fingers in his mouth, wearing an orange and white jumper that I picked out for him. I'm hugging him close and grinning at the camera like he belongs to me. Even now, I can remember how proud I was to be a big sister. I'm still that damn proud.

"Oh my god! Look at you!" Erica takes the photo, cradling it in her palms. "You're so beautiful!"

"If you overlook the braces and the acne, I was adorable." I pull out another photo, one of Savannah and Trevor that I took the previous year. "Wow! I haven't seen this one until now."

Erica accepts the photo of the kids as I rifle through the others, pulling out one here and there. One of my favorites is a shot of me smiling at the camera over my Dad's shoulder. Mom took it a few weeks before the boating accident when I was twenty. I can't believe how much my father has aged in fifteen years. His hair had a little brown in it back then ... now it's solid gray. I find pictures of Joel and Hope, a profession shot of me and my mother, and several others of me as a little girl. Erica seems amazed by how much *I* changed. I guess maybe she's right. In photos of me after twenty years old, after Jazz was injured, my smile never quite makes it to my eyes.

Until her.

When I tell her that ... we forget all about the photos in favor of making out in front of the Christmas tree.

Hey, don't knock it til you try it!

The next day we brave Black Friday to buy picture frames. After witnessing first hand how stupid people are during early morning shopping, we head home and I help her arrange the hallway with our joint photos. Erica's father shocked us both by sending us a stack of photos of his own weeks ago, but Erica didn't want to buy frames until she knew what my mother was sending. In a place of honor, on an antique table that we picked specifically to hold photos, Erica puts a shot of her biological mother at sixteen years old. Mary Elizabeth's blond hair is soft and long, hanging around her face as she looks at something in the distance. She's not smiling, but she's not frowning either. I choose to believe that she was pregnant with Erica in the photo and the look on her face is nothing short of wonder. Next to that, we put a photo of Rick vacationing in Hawaii, leisurely enjoying his day. The last photo we place on the table top is a picture of Erica and her grandfather, the one where neither of them are smiling, but she's sitting on his lap all the same. Now that I look a little closer, his head is leaning against hers and one hand is resting on her knee protectively. I've caught her looking at that photo more than once. Maybe he loved her. Maybe he wanted more for her than what either of his daughters could give her.

Erica's adoptive mother finds a place on the wall as well, but she carefully cut her adoptive father out of it. I didn't ask her why. When she's ready to tell me ... she will. We dot the hall with ourselves and our families (my parents, Joel and my dad, Rachel and Buddha) and even a picture of Addison, Mark, Erica and me at dinner. We look so happy, we look like we're all where we belong. Several of our pictures from Italy are thrown in and finally, we put up photos of ourselves separately with Jasper. The shots were taken on different days when we visiting him at the clinic and I love them both.

After we hang the last photo, I realize that there's a photo of just me, but there isn't one of just Erica. I'm showing off my engagement ring in it and when I protest, Erica shakes her head and says, "I don't want a single picture of me on this wall by myself, Lee. I've spent enough time that way to know exactly what I look like alone. I'm much happier with the people I love. Okay?"

I let her convince me.

And then I spend a while convincing her that she will never be alone again.

Nothing says commitment like multiple orgasms.

*~*~*~*~

Emma Foster's Christmas dress for the benefit is solid white with red and and green ribbons woven through the lace. Someone has put tiny little bells on her puffy sleeves so I hear her before I see her. I turn toward the sound of tinkling in time to catch her tap dancing and when I smile at her, she waves and runs my way. Her hair is in ringlets, framing her face beautifully. I kneel down in time to catch her as she rushes into my arms, hugging me tight. She smells like strawberries and when I kiss her on the cheek she's sticky. I make a face at her, wiping my mouth and she laughs. I think I could live to be one hundred years old and never get tired of that sound.

"Are you nervous?" I ask, turning down her frilly collar.

She shakes her head back and forth, hopping up and down in excitement. Her fingers fly over words that I can't understand and I make a mental note to become fluent in sign language before her next surgery. I would imagine that the only thing worse than not being able to vocalize what you want ... is being able to say it and no one understand. It's pure luck that Cristina comes along when I'm ready to scream in frustration. She squats down beside us and gives Emma a sweet smile. "Do you want me to tell her, kiddo?"

Emma nods.

Yang glances at me and says, "She wants you to know that your red dress is really pretty. She likes your hair when it's not braided and she can't wait to hear you sing again because at the last rehearsal you were the best."

Emma signs again.

"What did she say?" I ask.

Yang laughs a little. "She told me I shouldn't sing again because I'm bad at it."

Once more time, Emma's hands fly.

Cristina laughs now and says, "Ever. I shouldn't sing again EVER."

I smile as Emma covers her mouth and laughs again and then she's gone, darting off in a swirl of skirt and clacking shoes.

I push myself up and readjust my red dress. It's identical to the yellow one that I wore in Italy the night I proposed to Erica. Hey, why mess with perfection? Erica actually got teary eyed when she saw me in it so I'm sure that sex is in my forecast. Not that I've been experiencing a drought or anything. I think that the only thing more shocking than how smart Erica is ... is how voracious her sexual appetite is. She has officially broken her 'On Call Room' rule too many times to count and we've enjoyed the HELL out of every available surface in our house. And the red dress she is wearing for this benefit is enough of a reminder of how she looked on our special night in Italy ... that it's taking all of my resolve not to pull her into any empty room around us to do that thing I did in the limo after she said yes.

Life is good.

Life is very very good.

What is *not* good ... is the crowd that is steadily building in the big auditorium at the hospital. I pull back a green velvet curtain and look out at the people, feeling my stomach fall to my feet. Every seat is filled and it's standing room only in the back of the building. The richest, most high profile citizens of Seattle were invited and I spot a few political figures in the front row which only adds to my nervous jitters. I'm trying to decide if I could fake laryngitis or if I'd be better off purposely throwing myself down the stairs when Gavin appears beside me.

"Can you help me with this tie?" he asks, yanking at the offending fabric.

"What in the HELL have you done to it, Elvis?" I reach up, trying to work out the knot in it. "Good grief! It's a mess!"

"I'm nervous!"

"You?!" I gasp. "You're named after 'The King'. Hell, maybe you should have worn a glittery jumpsuit and walked out there looking constipated."

"For the record ... I don't like you."

"Say it with a straight face and I'll believe you." I finally loosen the knot and quickly repair the damage. When I turn his collar down and straighten his jacket, he's grinning like an idiot. "What?" I query.

"You look really pretty tonight, Calliope."

I return his grin. "I do clean up well."

"Yes, you do." He winks at me and takes a deep breath. "Okay. It's showtime."

"Don't fuck up your song. Don't get tongue tied. And make sure you guilt the rich bastards into opening up their wallets. Okay?"

"No pressure or anything," he says, giving me a one fingered salute.

I clap for him from the sidelines as he walks onto the stage and picks up his guitar.

It's going to be a long night.

*~*~

I somehow make it through my two Christmas songs and I manage to not piss myself laughing at George and Lexie. What they lack in tone they more than make up for in dancing. Emma laughs at them so much she can't sign the words at all. When they leave the stage, the little girl rushes past me and into the bathroom. Cristina manages to mangle her lyrics and then rewrites them on the spot to be as crude as a holiday song can possibly be. In the audience, I can see that Addison and Mark are collecting money left and right and I have to smile when they meet in the aisle and he rests a hand on her stomach.

During our Thanksgiving dinner, Mark took Savannah and Trevor into the backyard to play. It was a necessary thing for him to do. Those two children, overwhelmed with being in a new place, became holy terrors about an hour after their arrival. When Trevor knocked a pan of rolls into the floor and nearly scalded himself with boiling water, Mark zipped both kids into their jackets and headed outside to enjoy the light dusting of snow. I caught Addison watching from the window. I could tell that she was memorizing the view, tracing it into her mind the same way that Jasper traced his hand. When I joined her, peering out at Mark, who was tossing Trevor in the air ... I smiled so big my face ached. Erica was right about the view. It's breathtaking.

Addison leaned her head against my shoulder that day and said, "I'm going to marry him. You just wait. I'm going to ask *him*."

"You need pointers? I propose very, VERY well," I told her.

Erica arrived in time to agree. Then we plotted the best way for Addison to get her man.

Did I mention that life is good?

Fund raisers be DAMNED.

Jasper is in the front row wedged between my mother and Erica. His only infraction of the night so far has been to shout 'that's my sister' at the top of his lungs while I sang 'O Holy Night'. It's the same way he did it when I was in high school and performed 'Over the Rainbow'. I wish I had done that for him tonight. I didn't even think about it. I wonder if he still likes it. So much about him has changed in the few weeks he's been at the clinic. His hair has grown enough to cover his scar and it curls over his forehead like mine. He's so handsome in his suit that I couldn't hug him enough when he arrived with Jim.

I move behind the curtain again as Bailey finishes up her song and speaks about the clinic. She talks about how important it is to her, how wonderful Denny Duquette was, and how much money it needs just to operate for a week, a month, a year. I watch my parents put their heads together and then my father fishes his checkbook out of his breast pocket and I know that he's donating a huge sum. My suspicions are confirmed when Mom hands the check to Jasper, who passes it to Erica ... and her eyes widen into saucers when she glances down at it. She drops it in the basket Addison holds out and leans back, looking stunned.

Money, I think, is always going to be a sore spot with us.

When I mentioned that I'd like to donate money to the clinic to help them add on to the main building and get rid of the trailers, she refused. She didn't even think about it. She simply said that there was no way in hell that I was doing that and changed the subject.

I've decided that what she doesn't know ... won't hurt her.

For Christmas, Jim will be receiving a hefty donation from one Mr. Joel Torres and no one needs to know that it's actually my money, deposited into my brother's account. They'll all think that Joel is so happy about Jasper's recovery that he was feeling generous. I alone know that my brother is a tightwad asshole who would refuse to pay for anything if he could get away with it. When he dies, he'll probably want his entire bank account emptied and buried with him.

"You ready to sing our duet?"

I shake my head at Gavin, who has appeared beside me again. "Doesn't Yang have to sing again?"

"Yeah, about that ... no. Please ... no. Change in lineup. You and I will do this duet and then I need you to take her place and do something else. She doesn't want to go back out there and THEY don't want her to go back out there. So, it's up to you."

"Why is it up to me!? This was YOUR brainchild so YOU do it."

"I'll make your life very hard at work if you don't do this."

"Whatever, Gavin, you ass! You need *me* to make you look good at work because you spend all of your free time stuck up Cristina's ass and we both know it."

"It's not her ass that I'm stuck in, but you're close."

"Oh! Ew! You nasty little -"

Someone clears their throat behind us and I turn around to find Chief Webber standing just behind me. "Is everything okay here?" he asks.

"Just fine," Gavin says. "We had a small change in our schedule, but Callie is a true team player and she has agreed to perform an additional song to cover it."

"Who backed out?" Webber demands.

"Dr. Yang, through no fault of her own," Gavin replies. "She's been a little under the weather and I'm afraid that she's just not up to it."

"Oh, thank God!" Richard wipes his brow then realizes what he's said. "I mean, horrible that she's ill. Do I need to do see her? Has she been examined?"

I notice the way Gavin's eyes widen and say, "Gavin's examined her repeatedly, Chief. She's fine. I think it's stage fright, but I'll happily do this additional song if the two of you can approve the extra days off I wanted for Christmas because we're going to meet Erica's family in Nebraska and I haven't heard back yet."

"Damn." Gavin puts his hands on his hips. "You've got me by the short hairs."

"Trust me, Elvis, if I had you by the short hairs ... I'd be bleaching my hand," I fire back. "Am I off or not?"

"Fine. Fine ... I'll cover for you and make sure I have another set of hands for ortho," Gavin relents. "Now let's go do this damn duet and then you better close this show correctly and make every Scrooge out there who hasn't coughed up money ... cough up a treasury. Got it?"

"Bite my ass."

"I don't like gristle." Gavin winks at me, adjusts his headset, and walks onto the stage strumming his guitar. I pick up the microphone and listen to him work through the first verse.

"Here we are at last

Another year has come and gone

We reach for the stars to find

That we're not reaching on our own

Life's a little easier

If you find someone who

Climbs the tallest mountains

To stand there next to you"

I join him on the stage and in the chorus.

"You always hear people say

It's better to give than to receive

And with you by my side

I've learned how to believe

We can change the world

One small moment at a time

With my heart in your hands

And your heart in mine"

The next verse belongs to me and I pick Erica out in the audience, looking at her as I sing.

"Here we are at last

It's the best time of the year

And I'm so thankful every day

That I have you here

Life's a little easier

When you find that someone who

Braves the darkest nights

Just to get to you"

The chorus is the exact same as the previous one, but we add more riffs and finally close the song standing next to one another. When it ends, I see a shift in the audience (the light is blinding me so I can't see much) and I know that we're getting a standing ovation. Gavin and I bow (and I wrestle with the top of my gown) and then he leads me to the piano where I sit down, gritting my teeth. I didn't plan anything. This sucks.

"We had to make a last minute change and I apologize for that. Dr. Calliope Torres will be closing the show tonight and as you've heard, she's incredible so I think you'll enjoy it." He pats me on the back and smile. "Sing us out, Cal."

He called me *Cal*. Oh my god ... hell has frozen over.

I watch him exit the stage and take a deep breath. There's no music book in front of me, no ideas rolling through my head. I lift one hand, unsure of what to sing at all, when Jasper bellows, "Sing 'Wizard of Oz', Lee! Sing it real loud!"

I laugh a little and lower my hands, resting them in my lap. Into the microphone, I say, "That's my brother. He's a big fan of that movie."

I can hear people laughing a little and take another deep breath. "Fifteen years ago, he was injured so severely in a boating accident that the doctors told us he would never walk again. They said that he would likely never speak, that he would probably remain in a vegetative state, and that we'd be better off putting him in a home somewhere. We didn't believe them. My parents never gave up and recently he underwent surgery on his brain, surgery that is still in the trial phase, and he's coming back to us with each passing day.

"In his favorite movie, Dorothy dreams of returning home and she clicks her ruby slippers to do that. My brother Jasper didn't have ruby shoes, but he had medicine and every penny that you donate tonight will help people like Jasper find their way home. Because we have to believe that 'Somewhere Over The Rainbow' exists for everyone, even the hardest cases, and you can help make sure they live to see it."

I close my eyes and start to sing a capella and then I play the piano softly, blending it with my voice as I sing my brother's favorite song for him. When it's over and I stand up to take my bow ... Jazz is right in front of the stage and he's got tears on his face. He's clapping so hard that it knocks the handkerchief out of his suit pocket, but he doesn't notice. My prom date, my first best friend, my buddy, my brother ... is proud of me.

And even though he has a tough road ahead of him ... I think he's grateful.

I know I am.

*~*~*~*

*~*~*~*

There are some things that you can count on in life. People breaking their legs during the holiday season is basically guaranteed. The final day before my holiday vacation to Miami and then to Nebraska finds me in and out of operating rooms so much that the scrub nurse suggests a revolving door. I don't know what causes it, but holiday cheer does *not* follow patients into the emergency room. By noon I've been called every vile name that a woman can possibly be called and a few that would offend men. By three o'clock, I've been threatened with bodily harm no less than three times and when I snap a heavyset man's arm, he nearly yanks me bald with his free hand.

Needless to say, I'm not in the best mood when my shift ends and it gets worse when I find out that Erica left earlier in the day with Addison. I really wasn't looking forward to driving myself home. Erica is accustomed to driving in the snow and assures me that we'll see plenty of it in Nebraska after the warmth of Miami, but I am *not* used to driving on it. By the time I actually make it home, I have a sour disposition and my hands are hurting from the death grip I had on the steering wheel. I've decided that I do like Miami after all. And I can't wait to put on a pair of shorts and walk barefoot in the sand on Christmas Eve.

I feel like I have frostbite when I finally make it up the stairs leading to the living room and I groan when I see that there's no fire in the fireplace. I don't even know if Erica's home. She didn't answer her cell phone. I hang my coat, pull off my gloves and hat, and hurry to the kitchen where I choose wine over hot chocolate. I take several sips, refill the glass, and walk up the stairs to the bedroom, intent on taking a hot bath. The second I open the door ... I'm on sensory overload.

The wine is strong on my tongue, tasting incredible.

The scent of lilacs is almost overwhelming.

The room is flickering with candlelight.

And I nearly drop the glass in my eagerness to touch the milky white thigh that is showcased so beautifully.

Erica is sitting in the corner chair, her bare legs resting on the Ottoman. One is bent slightly and she's wearing nothing but her lab coat and stethoscope. I watch as she shifts a little and the jacket falls open, exposing her left breast fully. She motions for the glass and I look down to see that I'm a fraction of an inch from spilling it. I hand it to her and watch her take a drink. When she licks her lips, my legs start to quiver. "Erica -"

"I heard you had a bad day."

"Had. That's the operative word. It's looking up."

She grins at me, sets the glass on the floor next to the chair, and stands up. I seize the opportunity and trail my fingertips over her waist.

She kisses me tenderly and I can taste the wine I poured for myself on her lips and tongue. She always tastes sweet to me, but tonight the wine has made her taste even sweeter. I can't get enough of her, and my hands start to roam as I deepen the kiss. The softness of it still shocks me. The lack of stubble, the smooth contour of her jaw, her breasts against mine ... I don't think I'll ever get tired of it or get used to how right it feels.

I nearly cry out in agony when she slowly pushes me away.

"Now, now, Dr. Torres. I'm sure your stress levels are elevated. I think you need a complete physical examination."

I look at her and want to laugh, but the laugh gets caught in my throat as I stare at her creamy skin barely hidden under her lab coat. The lapels of that damn coat are hiding what I so desperately want to feel. I push the sides back and slide my fingers over both of her breasts.

"A physical examination, huh?" I ask as she slowly starts to unbutton my shirt. I hold my breath as she pushes it off, over my shoulders. "And you think you should give it to me?"

"Yes," she says as she places the stethoscope on my chest. She's such a considerate lover that she's already warmed the metal so it won't be a shock against my skin. "Your heart rate is elevated, Callie," she whispers as she cups one of my breasts, rubbing her thumb over the satin of my bra. "Hmmm, that could be a bad sign."

"It's you, Dr. Hahn. You get my pulse going."

"Oh really?" she asks me as she rubs down my stomach and slides her hand in the front of my pants. "Let me see what else I do to you."

"Only at Seattle Grace would the cardio doctor be examining *that*."

Her eyes are twinkling when she chuckles and then her face is serious when her finger glides against my wetness. "My goodness. I should have a closer look."

"By all means." I hold very still as she unbuttons my jeans and kneels down. My mind flashes to Miami, when she kneeled in front of me the first time she ever touched me. Just like then, she deftly slides off my shoes and then eases my pants over my legs until I can step out of them.

"You are wearing *my* panties." She traces the lace of a pair of yellow panties just like her blue ones. "Dear God, Cal, I see why you like them so much on me now. Turn around."

I comply and hear her intake of breath as she appreciates the view. I appreciate the feel of her palms running over the globes of my bare ass as she kneads my flesh. When I feel her lips, then her teeth, on the back of my sensitive thigh, I moan and shiver. Goosebumps dot my flesh as she whispers, "If you weren't already seduced, you would be now."

"You should probably keep going, Erica. Just to be safe."

She bites my ass, causing me to yelp, and then presses a kiss against it. I feel her mouth on the small of my back, just above my panty line, and then she slowly moves upward, exhaling against me as she kisses her way up my spine. When she fastens her lips to the back of my neck and sucks a little, my legs threaten to buckle. I feel my nipples harden into buds and I know that if she could hear my heart now, she'd be inclined to give me mouth to mouth. I'm dying. I know that I am. Her fingers dance over my back and sides and she walks around me and then the stethoscope is back on my chest. One of her brows quirks a little and she gives me a smile that can only be described as impish.

"You're beautiful," I murmur, plucking the steth from her ears and tossing it into the chair. "But you're even better when you're naked."

She lets me push her jacket off and when it clears her hands ... they're all over me at once. She has my bra unfastened and across the room so fast that I gasp and then her mouth is on mine, her breasts are flush against my own, and she's holding me so tightly that I can barely breathe. I moan when she sucks at my tongue and cry out she rakes her nails over my sides. "Fuuuuck."

"Sorry," she mumbles, bending down to kiss the scratches.

I drop my hand into her hair and watch as she kisses her way over my stomach and then traces the scar she gave me with her tongue. When she pulls my panties down and latches onto the scar that I earned in the accident so many years ago ... I feel my toes curl into the carpet and I know that I could get off on this alone. But she doesn't let me. She reaches to one side and grabs the Ottoman, lifting my leg so that my foot is resting against it and my leg is raised, opening me to her. When her tongue slides over my sex, I let my head fall back and dig my fingers into her hair, holding her where I want her the most. She complies, her arms moving through my legs and pulls me closer to her. Her tongue is doing amazing things when she slips her fingers into me.

I won't last long.

And she doesn't seem interested in prolonging the release that she will inevitably bring.

When she moans my name against me, I'm done.

I come so hard that my legs do buckle and I sit down on the ottoman with a loud 'ooomph'. She moves closer to me, situating herself between my knees and laves one nipple, then the other. As soon as the stars stop exploding behind my eyelids and I'm not a second away from a stroke, I kiss her, cupping her face. I can taste myself, the wine, and something that I finally realize is what I've searched for all my life.

I taste home.

Erica Hahn has given me the home that I always wanted and never knew how to achieve.

I taste the rainbow as I sail somewhere over it ... where dreams really do come true.

The End

Syke ...

Epilogue

Erica and I take Jasper home to Miami for Christmas. On the flight, he keeps us entertained with tales of his friends at the clinic. I don't know what Jasper will do with his life now, but I think he could make a living as a stand up comic. His impressions of Jim, Nurse Gladys, and Geneva being angry that the piano is being tuned are so funny that I nearly pee my pants laughing. When he does impressions of me and Erica, I have to go to the bathroom. When I return to my seat, Jazz has on earphones and loudly tells me that he's watching a movie.

I slide into my window seat and take Erica's hand. "Are you looking forward to seeing the beach again, Yellow?"

She purses her lips a little and I know that she's concerned about going back to the place that started and ended so much for us. "You think your mother will let us share a bed?"

"Are you kidding? She'll probably lock one of us in the basement."

"We could get a hotel room."

"Or not. If she does lock one of us in the basement ... I happen to be pretty good at picking locks."

"And then we'd have a repeat of Lori Anne's morning freak out." Worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, Erica adds, "I never thought I'd go back to your family's house. Even now ... I'm surprised that she invited me."

"I think we finally won her over." I take her hand and kiss it. "Besides, she knows that we have this damn trial with Savoy starting next month so she's going to be on her best behavior."

"I hope they throw the book at him."

"I hope it's heavy."

She nods.

We pass the remainder of the flight discussing the case against Dr. Savoy and sentence he could possibly get. From what we've been told, Savoy faces a lengthy prison term. With Izzie's testimony, as well as mine, the district attorney believes that we will see a guilty verdict. I hope he's right. Even though our home is protected with top of the line security now, I still have trouble walking up the front steps ... where the deer bled out. We're planning on repainting everything and that can't happen soon enough. I think that a fresh coat of color will erase the ugliness of what transpired there. I have to believe that.

My father picks us up at the airport and I quickly shed the outer layer of my clothing before I climb into the limo. Miami is a balmy eighty four degrees and the sky is so blue that it looks abnormal after seeing gray for so long. When we arrive at the house, my mother is waiting on the circular staircase and she rushes forward, hugging Jasper to her. She hasn't seen him since Thanksgiving and she's crying as she frets over his long hair (it hangs in his eyes) and his baggy jeans. He shakes his head and says, "It's cool, Mom" before he rushes past her calling for Buddha.

When my mother hugs me, I let her hang on for as long as she wants to. As much as Jasper is poised to eventually leave home, I'm finally coming back. I want to be here. I want to celebrate Christmas with my family and I'm no longer ashamed of how much we have. I'm damn grateful for it. I let my mother plant a wet kiss on my cheek and watch her greet Erica the same way she greeted me and Jazz. She loves Erica's slightly shorter and insanely curly hair and grabs one of our overnight bags as we walk up the steps together. I follow along behind her as she heads down the hallway toward my room and opens the doors.

It looks the same way it did when Erica and I made love for the first time and my eyes widen when I see the yellow and red robes on the bed. Mom notices my reaction and says, "I - I stocked the bathroom with fresh towels and I - well - I remembered that you two have your yellow and red thing so ... I got you robes. It's part of your Christmas present."

I run my hand over the soft fabric of the yellow one. "They're beautiful. Thanks, Mom."

"The two of you will be ... comfortable ... in here, right? If you'd rather have a bigger bed you can use the -"

"No, this is fine." I can't hide my smile so I don't try to.

"We appreciate it, Lori Anne," Erica tells her, giving her another hug.

"Well, I know how hard it is to sleep without Santos and I want you both to rest while you're here." Mom rubs her back and then squeezes my hand. "Do you two want to take a nap? You had to get up awfully early to make the flight."

"LEE!!!" Jasper yells from down the hall. "WANNA SWIM!?!"

I nudge Erica and say, "I packed your bathing suit."

"Damn." She grimaces. "I was hoping you'd forget."

Ten minutes later, we're walking hand in hand on the beach and she stops every few feet to pick up a new seashell and look it over. "What are you doing?" I finally ask.

"I'm trying to find the match to the shell that I got the first time we were here. Then we'll both have one."

"You're a hopeless romantic."

"That's true." She hugs me to her and gives me a kiss. We're close enough to the water that we can feel the cool spray and she tightens her grip around my waist as I try to pull her in with me. "Wait."

"Quit stalling, Hahn." I point at the ocean. "You can't ease your way in. You have to run and dive."

"My body will go into shock. I just know it. It's *Christmas*. People don't swim in the ocean in the middle of winter."

"Yes, they do." I watch Jasper walk towards us. He's got on a pair of shorts and a t-shirt now. I guess some habits die hard because he sits down a few feet from us and meticulously rolls the legs of his shorts. He has always done that. I hope that he will ALWAYS do that. It's Jasper. It's a piece of him that I have loved since he first did it and it's one more thing that I will never have to miss. When he pushes himself to his feet, I know that he's about to demonstrate the run and dive.

But he doesn't.

He stands mere inches away from the water, not letting it touch his bare toes.

"Jazz?" I say his name softly to avoid startling him. He's watching the waves in the distance with a worried look on his face. "You okay, buddy?"

"Hope was skiing behind us that day," he says, his voice alarmingly monotone. "You were in the front of the boat and you were laying down on a towel because you were sick and you didn't feel like taking me skating. Mama said that the ocean air would clear up your nose and I was real worried because you were coughing a lot. You told Joel that I should have a turn skiing and he said no, so you were mad at him. I was mad, too. And he kept going faster and faster and you told him to slow down, but he said you needed to shut up. I tried to make him slow down, Lee."

I move closer to him, my heart thundering in my chest. "What?"

"I made him go faster by accident and then he tried to fix it and he wasn't looking where we were going no more. And then you screamed and I fell in the water and it hurt real bad 'cause I couldn't see you no more."

I close my eyes, conjuring up the memory of that fateful day. The acceleration had nearly rolled me over as the front of the boat shot upward. My eyes had locked on Jasper's, where he was sitting just behind Joel, and then the sounds of our boat colliding with the other had deafened me. I know I screamed. I know that there were moments of consciousness for me as I called for Jasper, writhed in agony, and tried to wrap my head around what had happened. Never, in a million years, did I think that Jazz had hit the throttle.

Or that Joel looked away so that he could rectify it.

I had always assumed that my older brother had been watching his new wife and couldn't concentrate on driving.

I had always assumed that I had been selfish in taking Jasper out, but now I remember that I had been feeling sick for days and my mother did tell me that the ocean air would help me. I remember being tired, achy, and miserable. I was so congested that I had been awake most of the night coughing.

I didn't take Jasper on the boat because I was being selfish.

I took him on the boat because I was sick and I wanted to be with him as much as possible before I headed back to school. I wanted to see him ski, something he had been telling me he had mastered, and I wanted to stand at the back of the boat and cheer him on as much as my scratchy throat would let me.

That's what really happened.

Jasper's clarity has become mine.

"It wasn't my fault," I mutter.

"Not your fault," Jazz confirms, holding out his hand to me. "Wanna swim now, Lee?"

My hand is shaking when I put it in his. He frowns and looks past me at Erica. Holding out his other hand, he waits for her to take it and then I feel her fingers weave through mine. We're the same holy trinity that we were before, standing together, joined by touch, by our hearts, by the truth. It's only fitting that my two anchors in life tether me so easily as the truth threatens to send me spiraling into the sky.

It wasn't my fault.

It wasn't my fault.

It wasn't my fault.

I want to scream it from the highest mountains and crawl into the deepest caves to yell it there as well.

I did not hurt my brother.

It was NOT my fault.

I feel weightless as Jasper takes a step back, tugging us with him. He lets go of Erica's hand and, still clinging to mine, starts to run. I have to jog to keep up and Erica does the same.

Together, we run into the welcome, calm waters and dive under.

Once upon a time, Jasper was baptized in the Atlantic Ocean and he came up differently.

This time ... I am baptized.

I come up as a different person and Erica is standing beside me to witness the rebirth of someone worthy of her, someone with no doubts, no reservations, and no worries.

She smiles at me and we lean against one another as Jasper swims around us.

You know, everything you've ever heard about straight jackets is true.

They're uncomfortable.

They're confining.

You feel like they're restricting your air and you can't break free no matter how hard you try.

My life? It used to be a straight jacket.

But the people that I love most have cut the restraints and I'm free at last.

The end! :)

So, we reached the end. It actually happened and I'm crying as I sit here because saying goodbye to this alternate reality feels bittersweet. I knew that it would be over eventually, but I'll be damned if I wanted it to. I can honestly tell you that writing this story was the best experience of my life. The support, the feedback, the new friends that I've made, the wonderful Callie/Erica community and the femslash readers have truly been a lifesaver for me. I wrote a lot of this fic while dealing with kidney stones and one infection after another. It was something that I poured myself into to escape the painful reality of my life and I can't thank all of you enough for helping me out. Your interest in this story, your questions, feedback, and critiques literally took my mind off everything. I really want to thank each of you by name, but I would feel guilty if I left anyone out. Please know that I appreciate every comment that was left for me. I don't think my replies back to all of you come close to being enough to show how much I admire you all, but I hope it helped. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you ALL!!!

If you haven't already, please visit .com/burningeden_fic to view the incredible art for this story, interview the author, see exclusive fic not posted elsewhere, and enjoy this story in the way it was intended to be shared (via journal) with the interaction.


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